416 thoughts on “My Seller Lied To Me! When Is It Property Misrepresentation?”
We have recently purchased a flat where the vendor answered ‘no’ on the TA7 form to having received a complaint from a neighbour. They also answered ‘no’ to any disputes with neighbours. We have since learned that there was a complaint made by the downstairs neighbour about their floor and there’s correspondence between them and the neighbour about it. Does this count as misrepresentation? What damages would we be likely to claim for?
Thank you for your comment. While we are unable to give specific advice in this comments section, it is possible generally to bring a claim in misrepresentation where a seller denies when asked that they have had disputes with neighbours about the property or any neighbouring property when in reality the opposite is true. However you would need to show that had you known about this dispute, you would have paid less for the property and as such you would have to show a loss that has come about as a result. If there was a single historical dispute that was subsequently resolved, then that is unlikely to be a source of any loss and damage to you. If, however, the dispute was not resolved or if there are continuing problems emanating from the neighbour, then that is a different matter.
In terms of damages, this is usually calculated as a function of the diminution in the value of the property as at the date you took up occupation, with the ongoing dispute in place. This usually will require a surveyor’s report to determine.
However, whether there is a claim here will depend on what exactly the dispute was and whether it is continuing. Please feel free to ring our Litigation department for a confidential discussion.
Hi We completed on a property in September last year, we had a home buyer report done which threw up a couple of issues that we were willing to rectify ourselves, as it was nothing major, it did state there were no signs of damp in the property but walls were plasterboard/drylined, the day after completion we walked into the property and there was an overwhelming smell of oil based paint and when we went upstairs the back bedroom wall had been painted in what looked like gloss paint, we rang the estate agent to ask them to contact the seller and ask were there any issues we should be aware of, we were informed by the agents the seller had got back to them and told them there was stains on the wall so he had used an eggshell paint as a stain blocker, turns out all that wall was soaking with damp. We put it down to bad luck and got on with it, but then I started getting strange patches of damp on the party wall at the front of the house which was put down to condensation but a professional damp proffing company as they were only in random patches, anyway on further investigation it turns out the wall is full of damp and the previous owner has hacked off the plaster half way up the wall and covered the damp area with foil backed Plasterboard, but worse than that the damp has caused all the floor joists to rot, there is a 3-4 ft void underneath the floor and he has propped the joists up with fence posts, laid ply over the floor boards and then laminate on top and to be fair unless the surveyor had ripped the house apart as we have the problems were not obvious, it turns out the house was bought and refurbished by a builder, there is no way he didn’t know about these issues and worse still purposely covered them up, I know this as I’ve since found the original advert for the house from when he purchased it, and everywhere we have problems are clearly showing in the original estate agent pictures, I should add that although we dealt with a man “the builder” throughout the sale it turns out the house was bought/sold on his daughters name, but in the legal form it states that no work had been done on the property since he owned it, which obviously he lied about we now know, do I have a case for a misrepresentation claim? as these are just a couple of the issues that we have encountered there are many many more I haven’t mentioned
If you were misled by the seller during the course of the transaction, then there may be a claim for misrepresentation. If the seller expressly informed you (and this would normally have to be in writing) that there were no problems with the issues that you are now encountering, then there would likely be a good claim. It would also not be overly relevant whether or not the seller was being truthful or not in the information that they were providing.
The fact that you obtained a survey which did or did not identify the issues is also not necessarily fatal to the claim; there is some limited case law in relation to a case of damp where the surveyor did identify the issue but not in the place which the seller stated. Whether or not there is also scope to pursue the surveyor on the basis of professional negligence will depend heavily on what the surveyor agreed to do for you (called the “retainer”). Normally, as you identify, a surveyor would limit the scope of their retainer in a way which means that they cannot be held liable for negligence in circumstances where it would not be possible to identify the issue without deeper or invasive investigation.
In some cases, a misrepresentation claim can arise by reason of what is not said, but these sorts of cases are relatively rare. For example, if the seller was specifically asked to provide details of any damp in the property and the response was an understated one which did not reflect the accurate position (for example, explaining that there were minor issues of damp rather than extensive issues), if the seller allowed you to proceed based on an obvious misunderstanding on your part, then there could be a claim for misrepresentation.
The basic position in any sort of misrepresentation claim is that the seller would have had to have said something to the buyer which is inaccurate but the buyer relied on this when purchasing the property. Put in the simplest of terms, a buyer cannot hold a seller liable for misrepresentation unless the buyer has been misled about the issue in question by the seller. If the buyer has not been misled, the “buyer beware” principle will apply.
It sounds as though the basis of your claim would be because the seller expressly stated that no building work had been undertaken on the property when it had been. Had you been advised of any building work, then you would have been able to enquire further into the nature and extent of that and make an informed decision.
Depending on the works undertaken, there is also an outside chance that there could be a claim pursuant to the Defective Premises Act 1972. However, such a claim would normally be restricted to matters where there has been a conversion of a property and the materials used or workmanship were such as to render the property uninhabitable (although there is some case law which supports the view that if the property in the future become uninhabitable as a result, this would still apply).
We are unable to provide specific legal advice on our website. This is particularly for cases in potential misrepresentation claims, as the facts of each and every matter will be different. However, if you would like to explore the matter in more detail, please do feel free to get in touch.
We bought a house frome a seller who flips homes in a 55+ community. The house we bought from her was adorable really nice. We had a home inspection. The inspector said there was 5 years left in the roof, air conditioner unit was maintained, plumbing was good . After we moved in we had a leaking roof, plumbing pipes were not connected, air conditioner was going out, windows were crank windows that were screwed shut and cracked with no crank handle, the supposed new wood floors put through the house was put over wet damaged material, shower doors swing and don’t stay in place, when we replaced the refrigerator, behind the refrigerator the whole area had holes in the wall and damaged original materials, we found 3 outlets with no covers, outside outlet was open to weather, the seller bandaid anything and everything she could. We find more problems as we live here. We have only been in the house for 4 whole days. It’s going to cost 12,500.00 to replace the roof, 5,000.00to replace the air conditioner, 5,000. 00 to replace windows, 2,300.00 for plumbing, 12,000.00 to redo floors, 2,100.00 to replace back door, because it doesn’t close all the way, 200.00 for smoke alarms because there were none in the house. We are currently repairing what we can ourselves. We can’t afford to move now. We are so frustrated!!! So is our realtor!! This lady is currently flipping more homes in this community and currently lives in the community. I showed her some of the damage we could see and she said she fired the guy, and that was it. Please help 🙏 😢
Thank you for your comment and we are sorry to hear about this.
From the language you have used, it sounds as though perhaps this is not a property in England or Wales. We are only able to advise on the law of England and Wales.
Whether or not you have a claim will depend on what you were told by the seller about the condition of the property. If nothing was said about this, there it would be unlikely that there is a claim.
If your surveyor/inspector check the property for you but missed the issues you have identified, depending on the scope of the retainer (i.e. what the surveyor agreed to do) there may be a professional negligence claim against them.
Note: This is general guidance only and should not be relied on as a substitution for properly considered legal advice.
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We have recently purchased a flat where the vendor answered ‘no’ on the TA7 form to having received a complaint from a neighbour. They also answered ‘no’ to any disputes with neighbours. We have since learned that there was a complaint made by the downstairs neighbour about their floor and there’s correspondence between them and the neighbour about it. Does this count as misrepresentation? What damages would we be likely to claim for?
Thank you for your comment. While we are unable to give specific advice in this comments section, it is possible generally to bring a claim in misrepresentation where a seller denies when asked that they have had disputes with neighbours about the property or any neighbouring property when in reality the opposite is true. However you would need to show that had you known about this dispute, you would have paid less for the property and as such you would have to show a loss that has come about as a result. If there was a single historical dispute that was subsequently resolved, then that is unlikely to be a source of any loss and damage to you. If, however, the dispute was not resolved or if there are continuing problems emanating from the neighbour, then that is a different matter.
In terms of damages, this is usually calculated as a function of the diminution in the value of the property as at the date you took up occupation, with the ongoing dispute in place. This usually will require a surveyor’s report to determine.
However, whether there is a claim here will depend on what exactly the dispute was and whether it is continuing. Please feel free to ring our Litigation department for a confidential discussion.
Hi
We completed on a property in September last year, we had a home buyer report done which threw up a couple of issues that we were willing to rectify ourselves, as it was nothing major, it did state there were no signs of damp in the property but walls were plasterboard/drylined, the day after completion we walked into the property and there was an overwhelming smell of oil based paint and when we went upstairs the back bedroom wall had been painted in what looked like gloss paint, we rang the estate agent to ask them to contact the seller and ask were there any issues we should be aware of, we were informed by the agents the seller had got back to them and told them there was stains on the wall so he had used an eggshell paint as a stain blocker, turns out all that wall was soaking with damp. We put it down to bad luck and got on with it, but then I started getting strange patches of damp on the party wall at the front of the house which was put down to condensation but a professional damp proffing company as they were only in random patches, anyway on further investigation it turns out the wall is full of damp and the previous owner has hacked off the plaster half way up the wall and covered the damp area with foil backed Plasterboard, but worse than that the damp has caused all the floor joists to rot, there is a 3-4 ft void underneath the floor and he has propped the joists up with fence posts, laid ply over the floor boards and then laminate on top and to be fair unless the surveyor had ripped the house apart as we have the problems were not obvious, it turns out the house was bought and refurbished by a builder, there is no way he didn’t know about these issues and worse still purposely covered them up, I know this as I’ve since found the original advert for the house from when he purchased it, and everywhere we have problems are clearly showing in the original estate agent pictures, I should add that although we dealt with a man “the builder” throughout the sale it turns out the house was bought/sold on his daughters name, but in the legal form it states that no work had been done on the property since he owned it, which obviously he lied about we now know, do I have a case for a misrepresentation claim? as these are just a couple of the issues that we have encountered there are many many more I haven’t mentioned
Thank you for your comment.
If you were misled by the seller during the course of the transaction, then there may be a claim for misrepresentation. If the seller expressly informed you (and this would normally have to be in writing) that there were no problems with the issues that you are now encountering, then there would likely be a good claim. It would also not be overly relevant whether or not the seller was being truthful or not in the information that they were providing.
The fact that you obtained a survey which did or did not identify the issues is also not necessarily fatal to the claim; there is some limited case law in relation to a case of damp where the surveyor did identify the issue but not in the place which the seller stated. Whether or not there is also scope to pursue the surveyor on the basis of professional negligence will depend heavily on what the surveyor agreed to do for you (called the “retainer”). Normally, as you identify, a surveyor would limit the scope of their retainer in a way which means that they cannot be held liable for negligence in circumstances where it would not be possible to identify the issue without deeper or invasive investigation.
In some cases, a misrepresentation claim can arise by reason of what is not said, but these sorts of cases are relatively rare. For example, if the seller was specifically asked to provide details of any damp in the property and the response was an understated one which did not reflect the accurate position (for example, explaining that there were minor issues of damp rather than extensive issues), if the seller allowed you to proceed based on an obvious misunderstanding on your part, then there could be a claim for misrepresentation.
The basic position in any sort of misrepresentation claim is that the seller would have had to have said something to the buyer which is inaccurate but the buyer relied on this when purchasing the property. Put in the simplest of terms, a buyer cannot hold a seller liable for misrepresentation unless the buyer has been misled about the issue in question by the seller. If the buyer has not been misled, the “buyer beware” principle will apply.
It sounds as though the basis of your claim would be because the seller expressly stated that no building work had been undertaken on the property when it had been. Had you been advised of any building work, then you would have been able to enquire further into the nature and extent of that and make an informed decision.
Depending on the works undertaken, there is also an outside chance that there could be a claim pursuant to the Defective Premises Act 1972. However, such a claim would normally be restricted to matters where there has been a conversion of a property and the materials used or workmanship were such as to render the property uninhabitable (although there is some case law which supports the view that if the property in the future become uninhabitable as a result, this would still apply).
We are unable to provide specific legal advice on our website. This is particularly for cases in potential misrepresentation claims, as the facts of each and every matter will be different. However, if you would like to explore the matter in more detail, please do feel free to get in touch.
We bought a house frome a seller who flips homes in a 55+ community. The house we bought from her was adorable really nice. We had a home inspection. The inspector said there was 5 years left in the roof, air conditioner unit was maintained, plumbing was good . After we moved in we had a leaking roof, plumbing pipes were not connected, air conditioner was going out, windows were crank windows that were screwed shut and cracked with no crank handle, the supposed new wood floors put through the house was put over wet damaged material, shower doors swing and don’t stay in place, when we replaced the refrigerator, behind the refrigerator the whole area had holes in the wall and damaged original materials, we found 3 outlets with no covers, outside outlet was open to weather, the seller bandaid anything and everything she could. We find more problems as we live here. We have only been in the house for 4 whole days. It’s going to cost 12,500.00 to replace the roof, 5,000.00to replace the air conditioner, 5,000. 00 to replace windows, 2,300.00 for plumbing, 12,000.00 to redo floors, 2,100.00 to replace back door, because it doesn’t close all the way, 200.00 for smoke alarms because there were none in the house. We are currently repairing what we can ourselves. We can’t afford to move now. We are so frustrated!!! So is our realtor!! This lady is currently flipping more homes in this community and currently lives in the community. I showed her some of the damage we could see and she said she fired the guy, and that was it. Please help 🙏 😢
Thank you for your comment and we are sorry to hear about this.
From the language you have used, it sounds as though perhaps this is not a property in England or Wales. We are only able to advise on the law of England and Wales.
Whether or not you have a claim will depend on what you were told by the seller about the condition of the property. If nothing was said about this, there it would be unlikely that there is a claim.
If your surveyor/inspector check the property for you but missed the issues you have identified, depending on the scope of the retainer (i.e. what the surveyor agreed to do) there may be a professional negligence claim against them.
Note: This is general guidance only and should not be relied on as a substitution for properly considered legal advice.