Uk law

Mr Pine has approached your firm regarding the purchase of a house and you have been asked to provide a letter of advice to him regarding the potential merits of a claim(s) against his estate agent, surveyor and/or previous solicitors. If you consider that he has a strong case he would like to know what the next stages of the process are and what the quantum of damages would be should he decide to proceed. You should also consider how his case would be proved or disproved in court and therefore what evidence is required. The facts of Mr Pine potential case are as follows:

In June 2014, Mr Pine saw an advert in the window of ‘Perfect Place’ estate agents in Salisbury for a house in one of the surrounding villages. He was informed by the estate agents that “the house is detached, has three bedrooms, comes with a free standing double-garage with its own power supply and is therefore has the potential for conversion to a workshop and is in a semi rural location at the edge of the village of Idmiston”. Mr Pine explained that he had taken early retirement from the Civil Service and that he required a property in which he could have a workshop. He was anxious that he should be able to use the workshop as quickly as possible.

Mr Pine viewed the property and was confident that the garage, if divided, provided the necessary space for a workshop and to park his car. The asking price of the property was £350,000, which would leave him with a small sum to make the necessary adjustments to the garage, namely a dividing wall. Mr Pine approached his bank to arrange a mortgage. As with all property transactions his bank required a survey to show that the property was worth the asking price. Mr Pine engaged a local firm of solicitors, ‘Smiley & Co.’ to act on his behalf and his first instruction to the firm was to employ a surveyor to provide the necessary survey for his bank.

‘Smiley & Co.’ is a well-established firm that has acted across a number of years in property transactions. During this period, it has used a local and reputable firm of surveyors, ‘Circus Surveys’, to carry out all of its clients survey work. Mr Pine’s instructions were that he would like a full structural survey and that this was to specifically include the garage. As he explained, it was important that the garage was structurally sound as he wished to use it as a workshop.

All of ‘Circus Surveys’ surveyors are professionally qualified. ‘Circus Surveys’ had recently employed a newly qualified surveyor, Miss Blunt, who was instructed to survey the property on Mr Pine’s bank and his behalf. Miss Blunt visited the property on a day when she did not feel particularly well. The light was not good and she had forgotten to charge the battery for her camera. She inspected the house making a few scribbled notes including the wooden floorboards were of “sound quality”. Carpeting mostly covered the flooring and therefore she failed to spot evidence of woodworm, which was apparent if the cupboard under the stairs had been opened. She took a number of interior and exterior photographs of the house with the intention that they were to help her in preparing her report.

Miss Blunt proceeded to the garden where she found what she described as a “garage in 9-inch brickwork and in satisfactory condition”. She was unable to photograph the garage as her battery was now flat.

Miss Blunt returned to the office where she prepared her report. Normally all reports would be checked by a senior partner, but in this case, as she was aware of its urgency, she signed it on the firm’s behalf and sent it to Mr Pine’s bank. Mr Pine, delighted with the findings of the report which stated: “for its age the property is in excellent condition and will require nothing other than routine maintenance in the near future” decided to proceed with the purchase.

A number of weeks after moving in Mr Pine engaged a local builder to carry out the conversion of the garage. The builder quickly explained that this would not be possible as the garage was in fact “breeze block with a corrugated asbestos roof” and that the only course of action was to have the asbestos roof removed as it was brittle and fragile. This would incur additional expense and delay, as a specialist contractor would be needed for this work. The builder also informed Mr Pine that due to the friability of the asbestos he should not be using the garage as he risked injury to his health.

Mr Pine has since had an independent inspection carried out which confirms this. He also asked his surveyor to inspect the house and has been informed that the wooden flooring has woodworm which to treat will cost in the order of £45,000. He has had a quote for the removal of the asbestos from the garage and a new roof, which will be £30,000. Taking these potential expenses into account and the fact he has a garage he cannot use Mr Pine is of the opinion that he paid at least £80,000 more than he should have for the property.

Marking criteria
• The assignment should be professionally laid out and in a format that would be appropriate for sending to a client e.g. a covering letter with an opinion attached
• You should identify all of the potential parties to the claim and their respective liabilities
• You should explain which areas of law you are considering
• You should use case law where appropriate and a case list should be included
• You should explain how your potential client should proceed
• You assignment should be appropriately referenced

The assignment should be approximately 2,000 words in total. The assignment is to be submitted into on or before 18.00 on the 3rd March 2017. This will be used for determining the originality of the work, whether the deadline has been met and will be used for marking. No paper submission is required.
Suggested Reading List
Dugdale, A.M.; Stanton, K.M. and Parkinson, J.E. (1998) Professional Negligence, 3rd Edition, Butterworths
Galbraith, Anne et al (2005) Galbraith’s Building and Land Management Law for Students, Fifth Edition, Elsevier Butterworth-Heinemann
Holyoak, Jon (1992) Negligence in Building Law, Cases and Commentary, Blackwell Scientific Publications
Jackson, Rupert M (2002) Jackson & Powell on professional negligence, 5th Edition, Sweet and Maxwell
Marsden, Sally and Makepeace, Pauline (2003) Construction and Engineering Law: A Guide for Project Managers, LexisNexis Butterworths
Murdock, John and Hughes, Will (2001) Construction Contracts: Law and Management, Third Edition, Spon Press
Murdock, John (2005) The nightmare zone, The Estates Gazette, Nov 12, pp. 164-165
Murdock, John (2002) Negligence in Valuations and Surveys, RICS Books
Owens, Stephanie (1998) Law for the Construction Industry, Second Edition, Addison Wesley Longman Limited
Patten, Ben (2003) Professional Negligence in Construction, Spon Press
Uff, John (2005) Construction Law, Sweet & Maxwell
Look at RICS website for informaiton
www.scl.org.uk and legal databases including: LexisNexis and Westlaw