Hi everyone,
I have an interesting situation unfolding and I thought I would post it here to see if anyone has any experience/advice/comments to add. Thanks in advance if anyone contributes...
Several months ago my wife and I purchased our PPOR, which we are about to move in to. Last week we received correspondance from the local council informing us of some details of the heritage listing of the house. This was a complete shock as we knew nothing about the house being heritage listed. No disclosure of a heritage listing was offered in any sales literature, advertising material, or in the auctioneer's preamble when encumberances etc are mentioned. In addition, I specifically asked the agent during an inspection if the house was heritage listed...he replied in the negative.
I am in the process of getting all the facts together, however the council has confirmed that correspondence was sent two month prior to the auction to the previous owner advising of a change of status of the property to being heritage listed. Further, the council confirmed the vendor's conveyancer received the appropriate paperwork (the name of the form escapes me) detailing the change, one month before the auction.
The property is a smallish house on a good sized block; it is a lovely property but one that we knew at the time of purchase that our young family would outgrow in 5+ years. Hence our long term plan was to either redevelop the block completely or make some significant modifications to the house. If we knew it was heritage listed with the associated restrictions on later development or immediate improvement, we would have had major reservations about moving forward with the purchase.
I have spoken to a friend who is an experienced agent and he mentioned that this sort of oversight happens more regularly than one may think.
My question is: does anybody have any experience of this sort of scenario, and if the details confirm there was a lack of correct disclosure, where do we stand legally and what would be a likely outcome if we pursued this matter????? My position is that we would have either not purchased the property, or certainly it would have weighed very heavily in our deliberations and certainly heavily affected the price we were willing to pay.
Eagerly awaiting any responses!
Cheers,
M
I have an interesting situation unfolding and I thought I would post it here to see if anyone has any experience/advice/comments to add. Thanks in advance if anyone contributes...
Several months ago my wife and I purchased our PPOR, which we are about to move in to. Last week we received correspondance from the local council informing us of some details of the heritage listing of the house. This was a complete shock as we knew nothing about the house being heritage listed. No disclosure of a heritage listing was offered in any sales literature, advertising material, or in the auctioneer's preamble when encumberances etc are mentioned. In addition, I specifically asked the agent during an inspection if the house was heritage listed...he replied in the negative.
I am in the process of getting all the facts together, however the council has confirmed that correspondence was sent two month prior to the auction to the previous owner advising of a change of status of the property to being heritage listed. Further, the council confirmed the vendor's conveyancer received the appropriate paperwork (the name of the form escapes me) detailing the change, one month before the auction.
The property is a smallish house on a good sized block; it is a lovely property but one that we knew at the time of purchase that our young family would outgrow in 5+ years. Hence our long term plan was to either redevelop the block completely or make some significant modifications to the house. If we knew it was heritage listed with the associated restrictions on later development or immediate improvement, we would have had major reservations about moving forward with the purchase.
I have spoken to a friend who is an experienced agent and he mentioned that this sort of oversight happens more regularly than one may think.
My question is: does anybody have any experience of this sort of scenario, and if the details confirm there was a lack of correct disclosure, where do we stand legally and what would be a likely outcome if we pursued this matter????? My position is that we would have either not purchased the property, or certainly it would have weighed very heavily in our deliberations and certainly heavily affected the price we were willing to pay.
Eagerly awaiting any responses!
Cheers,
M