I am looking at buying a 100plus year old house that has a ‘lower ground floor’ with living accommodation. This floor is below ground at the front but opens out to ground level at the back. We’ve had our offer accepted are now at the survey stage, we’ve asked the owners whether the surveyor can move furniture and lift corners or edges of carpets, which we will pay to have professionally refitted if required, to check for any signs of damp on the solid bottom floor.

The moving furniture was OK but the carpet request has been meet with an almighty refusal and an invite for us to pull out of the sale.

It may be an unusual request, but do you think it is an unreasonable one. Would you refuse if you were trying to sell your house.
Just trying to gauge if we are being unreasonable before deciding what to do.

What do they care if the carpets are lifted? They’re moving out.
Walk away, and wee in their shoes while you’re at it.

It is a completely reasonable request.

If they don’t want you to lift the carpets what are they hiding?

Hmmm..tough one. I’d ask your surveyor what they think. If it’s considered to be really important then walk away.

Who have they got buried under the carpet, Brookside close had a body under the patio, and Nielsen and afw others had bodies around the house and down the drains.

Walk away.

I had boards lifted in one house I had surveyed to check the condition of some joists I was concerned about. that meant removing carpets and cutting boards

Will talk to surveyor to see if they can check for damp through carpet with the damp meter they use.
I think they are upset that we’ve asked them if the floors were damp, and they said no, but are now wanting to verify.
House buying and selling seems to bring out strange emotions in people.

[We were ordered out of one house during a viewing when, during general chatting as we were going round the house, we mentioned that we were going to look at another house later that day – bizarre]

Did you smell anything odd in the house, damp or wet rot and dry rot have a distinctive smell, as do a lot of air freshners.Use dto cover the smell, also walk on the floor around the corners and see if there is any give. look for carpet stains as well especially around the walls.
a damp meter on the carpet may just show the carpet has been cleaned, or their is an incontinent animal there.

There were no bad smells, but noticed those plug in air fresheners in a couple of rooms.
There was no visual signs of damp and the rooms are nicely and newly decorated as they haven’t been in the house long.

id walk …… hiding something for sure …. if they werent and the survey was clean …. youd be buying the house and then who cares about the carpets ?

Have a look on http://www.nethouseprices.com and see how often the house has been sold

If the house is over a hundred years old, and it’s still there, what are you looking for?

If the house is over a hundred years old, and it’s still there, what are you looking for?

Confirmation that there is no damp rising through the floors. I don’t want to live/sleep in a damp room and there is no evidence of a membrane having been fitted, and remedial work could be expensive and disruptive.
Would you object to the request if selling?

They asked YOU to pull out of the sale? if they were that offended, they would have pulled out! I think they might be hiding something.