416 thoughts on “My Seller Lied To Me! When Is It Property Misrepresentation?”
I myself have been missold a chalet 4 years ago when I was told at the time of sale that the property was 15 years old. Now that I am selling the chalet, a would-be buyer was told that the property was 40-ish years old by my Landlord who was also the seller of my property. All he would tell me was how good the property was and what a deal I was getting but did not tell me that the chalet was positioned on a flood plain. He also kept on telling me for the next year how my chalet’s value was going up by £10,000 By the time he stopped talking to me the chalet had upped in price by approximately £50,000.
Thank you for this comment and apologies for the delay in responding. We are unfortunately unable to give specific legal advice over this medium as we have not full information as to what is going on here and have not had sight of any relevant documents, however, based on what you have said in your comment, we would mention the following.
While auction contracts are usually very heavily locked down with non-reliance clauses, it may be possible to circumvent these if you can show that the seller actively covered up the true picture, i.e. by saying that the property was let and achieving a given rental income when in reality it was not, and knew that he was taking steps to mislead or encourage you to form a false impression. Therefore it may be possible to obtain damages of and occasioned by the diminution in value as a result of his covering up the true position as to the occupation state of the property. However it may not be possible to bring a claim based on the need for repair works as, once again, it is not enough to show that the seller merely failed to mention something; they must have actively made a false statement to found a claim in misrepresentation.
If you are seeking further advice I would be grateful if you could contact us for a confidential discussion.
We completed in August 2024. Since moving in we have found so many issues with the property that was undisclosed during selling.
The wiring in the house is wrong. We have had to do a complete rewire because the previous owners have done so many DIY projects wrong. The plug sockets had lighting wires, the attic light was wired into the upstairs hallway, the electric shower was wired incorrectly and not on its own circuit. The downstairs bathroom light was wired into the kitchen lights. Also there was rodent damage to wires in the attic that had tape wrapped round them. They supplied us with a electrical certificate for the consumer unit, but we have had several electricians state in writing that they believe it wasn’t installed by a professional and the previous electrical work wasn’t completed by a professional.
We believed we had flat ceilings throughout the property. We began the rewire and surprise the ceilings are plasterboard covering Artex popcorn ceilings. So now we might have potentially been exposed to asbestos because the electricians have drilled through the floor to the downstairs ceilings exposing the damaged Artex ceiling concealed by the plasterboard.
Also, the conservatory attached to the kitchen, previous owners made themselves has been leaking. It has damaged the floor below and after inspecting it properly we can see that this has been an ongoing issue and they’ve just poorly sealed it with sealant.
The hot water and cold water was also mixing in the pipes. They never capped off the water pipe for the previous water heated shower after they installed the electric shower.
We ripped out the electric fireplace and discovered an incorrectly capped off gas pipe. We had to get this removed because it was hanging out of the wall.
Thank you for your comment and apologies for the delay in responding. It does sound like there are a lot of issues here with the property and that you have not had a good experience here. We are unable to give specific advice in such circumstances, though, as we have not seen any documentation relating to the property.
However, the starting point here is that it is not generally a misrepresentation for a seller to fail to disclose such matters as these. Rather, the seller is only required to give correct information where they volunteer it or answer questions about the property. Whether or not they are liable will depend on the contents of the Property Information Form and other communications you have had with the seller prior to exchange. For these reasons, I would be grateful if you could contact us for a confidential discussion should you wish further advice, or you could use our Fixed Fee Misrepresentation Assessment to take the issue further.
I recently purchased a property, foolishly I didn’t get a survey report and after moving in I’ve noticed the decking boards are bouncy and some are rotten, I never went into the garden as it was raining on one occasion and another occasion the sellers son was out on his trampoline and I didn’t want to disturb him, I didn’t ask any question about the garden and the seller didn’t declare anything, what can I do?
It would generally be a standard condition of the contract of sale that the buyer accepts the property in the condition that it is in.
There is also a general principle of law, and the basic position in respect of the sale of property, of “buyer beware” or “caveat emptor” (for those that feel the need to use Latin). This means that it is up to the buyer to decide whether or not they have enough information to proceed with their purchase.
As a seller is under no general duty to disclose anything about their property to the prospective buyer (and does not even have to answer questions that they are asked about it if they don’t want to, but a buyer might get a bit suspicious if the seller doesn’t), if a buyer proceeds to purchase the property and discovers a problem after completion, there is not really any way to hold a seller liable for this. It was the buyer that decided that they had enough information and proceeded to enter into the contract to purchase the property. It was not the seller that misled the buyer or otherwise failed to provide something about the issue to the buyer pursuant to a particular duty to do so.
Much of the time, misrepresentations occur because of something which is factually inaccurate contained in the “standard” pre-contract documentation, like the Property Information Form (TA6), Leasehold Information Form (TA7) or in the replies to the buyer’s solicitor’s enquiries. Sometimes emails, text messages and even things said directly by the seller to the buyer are factually inaccurate and misleading. It is when the buyer relies on such inaccuracies provided by the seller when deciding to purchase the property on the terms proposed that a misrepresentation claim can arise. A buyer should have copies of these documents, as their solicitor should have provided them for the buyer’s consideration, as they are obviously going to have a huge impact on the buyer’s decision to proceed further (and if a solicitor has not supplied such things, the solicitor may have been negligent).
If you feel that you have been misled in this way, and have the documentation and information that you consider to be misleading, we are trialling a fixed-fee initial evaluation of such matters, the details of which can be found by clicking here.
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I myself have been missold a chalet 4 years ago when I was told at the time of sale that the property was 15 years old. Now that I am selling the chalet, a would-be buyer was told that the property was 40-ish years old by my Landlord who was also the seller of my property. All he would tell me was how good the property was and what a deal I was getting but did not tell me that the chalet was positioned on a flood plain. He also kept on telling me for the next year how my chalet’s value was going up by £10,000 By the time he stopped talking to me the chalet had upped in price by approximately £50,000.
Thank you for this comment and apologies for the delay in responding. We are unfortunately unable to give specific legal advice over this medium as we have not full information as to what is going on here and have not had sight of any relevant documents, however, based on what you have said in your comment, we would mention the following.
While auction contracts are usually very heavily locked down with non-reliance clauses, it may be possible to circumvent these if you can show that the seller actively covered up the true picture, i.e. by saying that the property was let and achieving a given rental income when in reality it was not, and knew that he was taking steps to mislead or encourage you to form a false impression. Therefore it may be possible to obtain damages of and occasioned by the diminution in value as a result of his covering up the true position as to the occupation state of the property. However it may not be possible to bring a claim based on the need for repair works as, once again, it is not enough to show that the seller merely failed to mention something; they must have actively made a false statement to found a claim in misrepresentation.
If you are seeking further advice I would be grateful if you could contact us for a confidential discussion.
Hello,
We completed in August 2024. Since moving in we have found so many issues with the property that was undisclosed during selling.
The wiring in the house is wrong. We have had to do a complete rewire because the previous owners have done so many DIY projects wrong. The plug sockets had lighting wires, the attic light was wired into the upstairs hallway, the electric shower was wired incorrectly and not on its own circuit. The downstairs bathroom light was wired into the kitchen lights. Also there was rodent damage to wires in the attic that had tape wrapped round them. They supplied us with a electrical certificate for the consumer unit, but we have had several electricians state in writing that they believe it wasn’t installed by a professional and the previous electrical work wasn’t completed by a professional.
We believed we had flat ceilings throughout the property. We began the rewire and surprise the ceilings are plasterboard covering Artex popcorn ceilings. So now we might have potentially been exposed to asbestos because the electricians have drilled through the floor to the downstairs ceilings exposing the damaged Artex ceiling concealed by the plasterboard.
Also, the conservatory attached to the kitchen, previous owners made themselves has been leaking. It has damaged the floor below and after inspecting it properly we can see that this has been an ongoing issue and they’ve just poorly sealed it with sealant.
The hot water and cold water was also mixing in the pipes. They never capped off the water pipe for the previous water heated shower after they installed the electric shower.
We ripped out the electric fireplace and discovered an incorrectly capped off gas pipe. We had to get this removed because it was hanging out of the wall.
Any advice?
Thank you for your comment and apologies for the delay in responding. It does sound like there are a lot of issues here with the property and that you have not had a good experience here. We are unable to give specific advice in such circumstances, though, as we have not seen any documentation relating to the property.
However, the starting point here is that it is not generally a misrepresentation for a seller to fail to disclose such matters as these. Rather, the seller is only required to give correct information where they volunteer it or answer questions about the property. Whether or not they are liable will depend on the contents of the Property Information Form and other communications you have had with the seller prior to exchange. For these reasons, I would be grateful if you could contact us for a confidential discussion should you wish further advice, or you could use our Fixed Fee Misrepresentation Assessment to take the issue further.
I recently purchased a property, foolishly I didn’t get a survey report and after moving in I’ve noticed the decking boards are bouncy and some are rotten, I never went into the garden as it was raining on one occasion and another occasion the sellers son was out on his trampoline and I didn’t want to disturb him, I didn’t ask any question about the garden and the seller didn’t declare anything, what can I do?
Thank you for your comment.
It would generally be a standard condition of the contract of sale that the buyer accepts the property in the condition that it is in.
There is also a general principle of law, and the basic position in respect of the sale of property, of “buyer beware” or “caveat emptor” (for those that feel the need to use Latin). This means that it is up to the buyer to decide whether or not they have enough information to proceed with their purchase.
As a seller is under no general duty to disclose anything about their property to the prospective buyer (and does not even have to answer questions that they are asked about it if they don’t want to, but a buyer might get a bit suspicious if the seller doesn’t), if a buyer proceeds to purchase the property and discovers a problem after completion, there is not really any way to hold a seller liable for this. It was the buyer that decided that they had enough information and proceeded to enter into the contract to purchase the property. It was not the seller that misled the buyer or otherwise failed to provide something about the issue to the buyer pursuant to a particular duty to do so.
Much of the time, misrepresentations occur because of something which is factually inaccurate contained in the “standard” pre-contract documentation, like the Property Information Form (TA6), Leasehold Information Form (TA7) or in the replies to the buyer’s solicitor’s enquiries. Sometimes emails, text messages and even things said directly by the seller to the buyer are factually inaccurate and misleading. It is when the buyer relies on such inaccuracies provided by the seller when deciding to purchase the property on the terms proposed that a misrepresentation claim can arise. A buyer should have copies of these documents, as their solicitor should have provided them for the buyer’s consideration, as they are obviously going to have a huge impact on the buyer’s decision to proceed further (and if a solicitor has not supplied such things, the solicitor may have been negligent).
If you feel that you have been misled in this way, and have the documentation and information that you consider to be misleading, we are trialling a fixed-fee initial evaluation of such matters, the details of which can be found by clicking here.