Home Buyers/Home Sellers - General Binding Rules

You've been prudent enough to arrange for a Home Buyers Survey to be undertaken. After all, you're potentially either buying the dream property you've longed for or you are selling what could have been a much loved family home, so you want to make sure that everything going forward is right. However, general binding rule compliance on sewage systems does not feature in standard surveys so an independent survey should be obtained. It's always worthwhile to initiate one, given that replacing a septic tank could potentially cost a significant amount of money. We will survey the existing sewage system by firstly emptying the tank.  This is crucial to enable the condition and size of the tank to be confirmed.  We then use CCTV and specialist dyes to confirm the location and make up of the drainage field/soakaway and also check that all top water (roof/surface water) is not linked to the foul water system (advisory only).  Worse case scenario, should the present sewage system not comply this is not an issue.  We will as standard write down all applicable recommendations for the property to enable it to meet the general binding rules and also provide estimates guideline costs for the purposes of the sale. Prices can then be agreed between the vendor and the buyer taking these recommendations into consideration and written into the sale of conditions by the solicitor to enable the sale to move forward as planned.  The buyer will then have approximately 12 months to correct the system as stated in the report.

• Complies with Environment Agency General Binding Rules
• The tank condition and capacity
• Field irrigation / soakaway is working correctly
• Dye test all top water drains to ensure they are not entering the septic tank system
• The current system isn’t leaking or discharging into a water course