Renegotiating purchase price of property

Hi,
I have put a depoit on a dwelling over a year ago with a purchase cost of 400k. As the dwelling is nearing completion I will soon have to pay the full costs.

However I have concerns as the overall development (mixed use) will not be completed for another 2- 3 years, so i will effectively be living next to a building site. I was not clearly informed of the phasing of the development by the agent. Other concerns include the issue that car parking (multi storey) will not be provided for another 2-3 years also.

Do I have standing for re-negotiating the purchasing price agreed due to the discomfort and inconvenience this may cause me (i.e. noise and dust from nearby construction and lack of off street car parking)?

Any suggestions welcome.

spider7 said:

I was not clearly informed of the phasing of the development by the agent.

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There would be nothing wrong with an agent who is working for the builder not pointing out some of the less desirable aspects of the property such as 1st phase, parking etc.

I doubt you will have any success regarding the noise etc but if you were promised a parking spot with your home and none at all is provided it (a legal sense) may prove a breach of contract by the builder. You would need to examine the contract with your solicitor but if it was worded in such a way that you purchased the house and a parking spot together and they cannot provide you with a spot you may not have to pay over the rest of the money until this is provided.

If your house had no roof you wouldn`t pay would you?

Best of luck

You need to study the contract carefully. Builders usually have a clause in there to suggest that the state of anything external to the actual property does not have to be completed within any time scales.

I had a similar situation to this recently, where the builder wanted us to complete on a property that had no carpets down on the outside, and the car park was full of building material. When we objected, the builder stated that the outside does not have to be completed, the property itself is finished.

Although that was what their contract stated, we objected and threatened to pull out of the deal and court action to recover the deposit (on the basis that the whole area was inhabitable for a tenant resulting in a loss).

We negotiated hard and tough with them, to the point where they threatened legal against us to complete, but we stuck to our guns and managed to get a few months mortgage payments from them.

Check if the builder is managing to sell the apartments quickly, if not then you have more chance of winning as they need all the sales they can get and will be inclined to negotiate. Of course, check the contract too.

Kess