# Buying a house with no planning permission



## Dazagg (16 Jun 2017)

Evening,purchasing a property in the mid- lands .. Appreciate legal, engineer, and other advice!

I have paid deposit and signed contracts (not returned) on a property. I have been asking questions with reference to a large extension at the rear since the first day we went to view.. Auctioneer assured me that planning was not necessary as it fell below the threshold of 40sqmt. There is also an pantry and utility room on the back which ( this is the first problem!) she assured me were part of the original build. I suspected not! 
Today as we are about to exchange contracts the vendors solicitors advised that ..... You guessed it... Planning was required. So now vendor/purchaser have to apply for retention planning.

Vendor wants us to complete sale but with hold €5k until grant is issued. We do have good chances of getting retention according to our engineer.... But there is a chance that we wouldn't...

What do we do?...

What are our options re compensation for inconvenience, change of not getting planning, reducing pp to reflect issues .. I, sure there are more I'm bit thin king of.

Advice appreciated..


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## RedOnion (16 Jun 2017)

What's your solicitor advising? It's a stressful process buying a house in any circumstances, but this could add months to process. It's what you pay your solicitor for, so better to rely on than anonymous feedback on an internet forum.


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## PaddyBloggit (16 Jun 2017)

I wouldn't be sending back signed contracts until issue is resolved.


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## Dazagg (17 Jun 2017)

Contracts won't be returned until issue is sorted. Solicitor has advised us to think about how we want to proceed. They have advised that we either play hard and request substantial funds held back ie €20-40k, look for some kind of compensation € and look after the process ourselves.

Or...

In fear of them pulling out....

Just accept their deal and move on.

If the retention is not granted we are now the proud owners of a beautiful house with planning issues. We plan to develop the front which we will need planning for in time

Just wondering if anyone else had experience of this situation


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## PaddyBloggit (17 Jun 2017)

My advice is still the same .... if you sign contracts you've lost the battle and your bargaining chip is gone.

Don't sign on a property with planning issues as it could come back to haunt you.

If you are going for planning for the front later on the issue will crop up then too.

Get it right before you sign as it's not worth the hassle.


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## kceire (17 Jun 2017)

It's going to take 3 months for a retention application to be processed so sit back and let the vendor regularise the planning. Then you buy. 

If they or you pull out, the next buyer is going to be faced with the same problem.


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## Brendan Burgess (17 Jun 2017)

Your solicitor can only advise you on the legal implications of the various courses of action. They can't tell you what to do.

Are you buying for cash or with a mortgage? If you require a mortgage, it's likely that the bank will not give you the mortgage if there is a substantial issue outstanding. 

I think it's very messy, buying it and holding back cash for them to do something. This would end up with all sorts of legal problems. 

You should aim to be in a position to have nothing further to do with the seller after you have closed the sale. So your options are 

1) Tell them to get planning permission and don't return the contracts until that is done. 

2) Buy it as is and adjust the price downwards. You take the risk that you will have to demolish the extension. That would require a huge reduction in price. 

If you are a cash buyer, you are probably in a very good position to negotiate. Most people requiring a mortgage will walk away from this. 

Brendan


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## Leo (19 Jun 2017)

Dazagg said:


> Vendor wants us to complete sale but with hold €5k until grant is issued. We do have good chances of getting retention according to our engineer.... But there is a chance that we wouldn't...



5k!! They'll just walk away from that and leave you with the mess. 5k isn't nearly enough of an incentive to make sure they follow through. Ask your solicitor how much it might cost to chase them if they do just walk away. It'll likely be a lot more than 5k, with a good chance you'll get nowhere.



Dazagg said:


> If the retention is not granted we are now the proud owners of a beautiful house with planning issues. We plan to develop the front which we will need planning for in time



If retention is not granted, you will not get permission to do any other development until the issue is resolved.


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## valko365 (24 May 2020)

Dazagg said:


> Contracts won't be returned until issue is sorted. Solicitor has advised us to think about how we want to proceed. They have advised that we either play hard and request substantial funds held back ie €20-40k, look for some kind of compensation € and look after the process ourselves.
> 
> Or...
> 
> ...



Hello, this is an old thread, but just wondering how you got on afterwards? We you able to regularise the issue?  We have just about closed out on the purchase of a bungalow with an outstanding retention issue, which was effectively an entrance wall to the property which did not have a 45 degree angle on it. There was also an application to build another structure on the property but this was never even started.  We negotiated a 15k reduction as a result, the initial permission is almost 30 years old so is exempt from enforcement. We have accepted that we will have to regularise this to do anything in the future. We have been told by our solicitor and an engineer that it can be sorted, will just take months to do so, we're ok with this.

The reason why we pushed ahead with the purchase is based on location and property type which are extremely rare to find in our area and we have held out for a few years for this in the hope we would find the right place, now that we have, we are not willing to walk away.

ps, meant to add, the reduction we received was for the vendor to pay all our legal fees including stamp duty and the rest came off the overall price of the house, we had already offered 10k off the asking price at the beginning of the process which was accepted, so the overall saving to us was 25k. The money we would have paid out in legal costs is real money in our account now for us to add to the reno budget.


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