Hello and welcome to today’s informative property surveying blog post, in today’s blog post we are going to be looking into Party Wall Surveying matters, specifically taking a look into the appointment of Party Wall Surveyors.
When can you appoint a Party Wall Surveyor?
As the one who is proposing the works, you would be capable of instructing a Party Wall Surveyor as soon as you wish, if your planned works do fall under the Party Wall etc Act 1996 and you would be able to coordinate with them for the necessary Party Wall Surveying procedures such as the draft and serving of a Party Wall Notice.
As there are conditions and specifications that do need to be considered when serving the Party Wall Notice, such as the correct details of the building owners and/or their surveyors, the sections of the Party Wall etc Act 1996 that the planned works would fall under and drawings that are mandatory for any of the planned works that fall under section 6.
A surveyor would be able to walk you through this and even serve the Party Wall Notice on your behalf to ensure that it is all done correctly as, if there are errors this would make it invalid and so a new Notice would need to be served witch, in turn, could cause you further delays to your planned works.
One would also need to consider the best time to sever the Party Wall Notice as it has to be done 1 to 2 months before the planned works are going to commence depending on what sections of the Party Wall etc Act 1996 the works fall under.
For works that fall under section 1,6, a 1-month Notice would need to be given whereas for the planned works that fall under section 2 a Notice would need to be served a minimum of 2 months prior to the planned works commencing.
A further consideration that one would need to take and so would be wise to consult with a Party Wall Surveyor is the Party Wall Notice is only valid for 12 months.
So, some consideration is needed when deciding on when to serve a Party Wall Notice, if it is done too late and you already have contractors in place before the expiry of the notice date this could end up causing delays to your planned works, likewise, it would be best to not serve it too early in cases where planning permission is needed and still has yet to be granted.
As an adjoining owner, you would have the option to select a Party Wall Surveyor when you have received the Party Wall Notice.
Upon recitation, you will have the option to appoint a Party Wall Surveyor if you dissent to the Party Wall Notice.
Party Wall Notice Dissent
When dissenting to a Party Wall Notice you can do so in one of two ways, you can either dissent and chose an adjoining surveyor so there would be one surveyor acting on your behalf of both parties involved, or you can choose to appoint your own surveyor so there would be a surveyor for each party involved.
Third Party Wall Surveyor
If this is the case then a third Party Wall Surveyor would also need to be appointed by the two Party Wall Surveyors, in case there is a disagreement between the two Party Wall Surveyors that is not capable of being solved amicably.
If this is the case, then the third Party Wall Surveyor will need to be called upon to resolve the dispute in an independent manner.
There is also the option of consenting to the Party Wall Notice in which if you were to choose this then no surveyor would act on your behalf as consenting to the Party Wall Notice is seen as you being happy for the works to go ahead and if any issues were to arise then this would have to be resolved in a neighborly manner or by way of common law.
We hope this gives you further insight into the selection of a Party wall Surveyor and into Party Wall Surveying matters. If you have any further questions in regards to today’s topic or any of the other services that we offer here at Stokemont then please do not hesitate to get in touch today by either giving us a call or popping us over an email and one of our team of experienced Party Wall Surveyors will be happy to assist and advise you.
