HELP - Have I been mis sold my house?

[Mr H]

Hi

I'm hoping someone could please be kind enough to assist and provide some much needed advice.

After saving for 8 years, we bought our house 9 months ago in a rural town, and not long after moving in, we have continued to experience anti social behaviour from a car park opposite our house. This car park was put in place nearly 4 years ago, to ease the parking situation for the nearby football pitches.

Cars often arrive late at night (as late as 2am sometimes), playing loud music to the point our house vibrates, wheel spinning, doing donuts, doing drugs, littering. The police are saying it's a borough council issue, whilst the borough council are saying it's a police matter. We are still trying to get this resolved with both parties. We don't believe that any planning application was put through for this car park, so we also trying to question them if this car park was put here illegally.

Anyhow, at the time of buying the house, it was asked verbally if there were any known issues with this car park, but was told by the previous residents, that there's wasn't any at all. After speaking with some locals recently, it was discovered that this anti social behaviour has been going on since the car park existed (nearly 4 years ago), and it was alleged that the previous residents of our newly bought property made various complaints.

At the various times of viewing the house, we were just unlucky that we didn't see any of this anti social behaviour for ourselves, otherwise we wouldn't have gone through with it. We did our research on the area, but no red flags came up. We obviously didn't dig deep enough.

Like I said, this was only discussed verbally. I have looked over the TA6 document, and there is no mention of this anti social behaviour, nor does the document specifically asks for this information. It asks for disputes with neighbours, but doesn't specifically ask about neighbourhood issues.

Could it be possible to obtain police records of the complaints made by the previous residents under the Freedom of Information Act? This may give us the proof we need.

Could others who viewed the house have asked the same question about the car park? Could we approach the estate agents for assistance?

Where do we stand with this? At the moment, it's simply our word against theirs. Can we claim that this house was mis sold to us? Do we have a case?


Thank you for reading


Mr H

[Scot22]

I think it would be challenging to prove with no written evidence.

However, you must obviously like the property so I would tackle it by removing the problem. First I would contact my M.P. It is a serious constituency issue which they should help resolve. Do your own research about whether it is permitted. Contact your Police Commissioner. I expect others are affected. Try to create a group. There is strength in numbers. Also now the behaviour is breaking lockdor.

Despicable of the vendors so I might contact their solicitor to say you are considering legal action. No need but might cause anxiety.

[islandgirl]

I agree about taking action - also contact the local parish council and your district councillor. However I do not personally believe there would be any claim against the previous owners. How do you prove it bothered them? If they were "tucked up in bed wearing headphones playing Tom Jones tunes by 9pm every night and heard nothing" how do you prove otherwise? Unless of course they themselves had complained in the past. Could you simply campaign for gates which are locked when there are no matches? Our local parish field had some problems until we put up CCTV which helped enormously. Good luck and keep us posted!

[Scot22]

Excellent ideas. Perhaps Sports club might come on board. Not wanting to be associated with this behavior and looking for positive community relationships.

[R0b]

From a legal standpoint, if you are relying on a he said she said situation, you are more likely to find a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow than get a judge to agree with you. Property disputes are generally extremely expensive to pursue so if you were to challenge it then I would suggest your evidence is solid.

Ideally you should have asked your solicitor to raise an inquiry to the seller's solicitor and then they would have been bound by their response which you could then rely on as misrepresentation. Equally, there is no harm in knocking on a few doors and asking what the area is like etc.

Unfortunately, I think you may be stuck with this property but recommend looking at non-legal options to see if the noise can be stopped or at least reduced. As always, the general rule is caveat emptor.