It has been suggested that we get an electrical inspection done on a house we are thinking of buying.
Is this a good idea anyway or is the estate agent just covering his back?
Also how much should we expect to pay for this? I have been told about £200 but this seems a bit high.
Mark
Yes. Yes. I doubt you would get it any cheaper. Like all surveys expect it to fail, you need to spot the difference between the really serious failings and the minor ones.
Can't tell without seeing the place! If it's been built in the last, say, 20 years, and noe indication of bodging, it looks like CYA; if it's interwar, with fittings of a mixture of ages, the arse that's convered might just be yours ;-)
Certainly high for these parts - here in Bristol you're looking at more like 80 quid for a competent local electrician to spend the 1hr+ doing the inspection and writing out the NICEIC-or-similar Ree Port...
Stefek
I paid about £70 3 year ago, so £200 seems a bit high
Dave
I guess this is case of if you need to ask the question.....
The electric in this house were obviously in a poor way when we bought it, a little bit of nosing around confirmed that. but an inspection was pretty irrelevant because it was obvious it would need rewiring.
I suspect that they are most useful in older (say >20 years) houses where the electric's might look superficially ok, but there has been plenty of scope for mods of varying proficiency to have been carried out.
True enough.
On the surface the everything look ok - new consumer unit, fittings, etc.
It's a 50s semi which has been altered and extended over the years. We've got a structural survey on the place booked for Wednesday, and I'll get an electrical inspection done now as well.
Thanks.
Mark
No obvious bodging, but who knows. We're getting a structural survey done anyway so we'll have the electrics checked as well.
It was more the way the agent shoved a glossy leaflet at us that made me ask. Especially as the leaflet seems to be aimed at landlords rather than buyers.
I would have thought it should be about the same price here in Manchester, so I'll ring round a bit.
Thanks,
Mark
Are you planning on renting it out?
If so then I would get the inspection done.
Al
And a very difficult thing to check thoroughly given that most wiring is concealed.
No. We're just going to live in it ourselves.
I got the impression that the estate agent hadn't read them, but was pushing them out to everyone that got to the survey stage. I wonder if he gets a referal fee.
Me too.
Mark
It is a good idea to get one done but I would certainly get a few quotes before choosing who does it.
Fer sure - not that a simple inspection will be a whole "quoting" process, more an "are you free and how much do you charge". Go for a local outfit rather'n the electricity board (sorry, REC) - and do NOT use anyone recommended by the estate agent. Their contractual obligation is to act in the *seller's* interest, not yours; you want someone you can talk to about what their written report means. Indeed, in the best case, you want someone you can establish enough trust with that they'd say "this place is a nightmare: if you want written chapter-n-verse it'll be 80quid, if you want to save on the paperwork I'll take 50", or "recent rewire all nicely up to spec: if you want chapter-n-verse it'll be [etc]"...
Stefek
We charge £100 = vat for 3 bed property in Portsmouth Area.
I managed to get an electrician from the local paper to go round this morning at the same time as the structural surveyor. He has charged us
85 quid and has already faxed through the "executive summary", with the full report in the post.Nothing too major on the electrics it appears, at least nothing that will cost a lot to fix. He did flag up a few minor issues and a couple of worrying ones - All the brass sockets in the kitchen have live and neutral reversed and the dimmer switch in the lounge has no back box - it's screwed onto the plaster with rawlplugs and wood screws instead.
We're not going ahead though, as the surveyor recons that the kitchen extension is pulling away from the rest of the house and sinking. Almost certainly beacuse it has inadequate foundations.
Thank you everyone for your advice,
Mark
Shame you arranged the two for the same day really - would have saved yourself £80 if you hadn't!
Do what I did, ask an electrician to go round and quote for any work that needs doing. Most do a free quote.
Steve
well, there's dubious ethics there (if you've no intention of getting the work done); and you may get away with it multiple times if you live in the smoke or similar large city - in a smaller place you'll exhaust the supply of goodwill among the few sparkies willing to do speculative quotes (many are too busy doing paid work anyway).
Sorry if this sounds sanctimonious - you may well have asked for a quote in good faith. But we can't out of one side of our mouths bemoan the difficulty of finding reliable tradespeople to do smallish jobs, and on the other abuse them by getting free advice in the guise of quotes...
cheers, Stefek
It was somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember Steve Jones saying something like:
You mean deliberately waste someone's time?
Maybe that explains why we get so many people complaining about tradesmen who won't give free quotes!
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