RICS Valuation Survey
When you need to get your home formally valued, it makes sense to have it professionally valued by a RICS Registered Valuer to the RICS "Red Book" standard.
Property valuations can be for a mutitude of purposes: borrowing, divorce, probate, taxation & etc, and a valution by a RICS Registered Valuer is your assurance that the valuation will be carried out following 'best practice' and will be accepted by the courts and tax authorities.
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Why use a RICS Registered Valuer?
The RICS says the RICS Registered Valuer scheme is "our quality assurance mechanism that monitors all registered RICS members who carry out 'Red Book' valuations and ensures consistent standards. By appointing an RICS Registered Valuer, you can be confident that you are working with regulated and qualified professionals"
To provide a valuation a RICS Surveyor must also be a RICS Registered Valuer, and the valuation must adhere to the RICS 'Red Book' valuation standards. The RICS Red Book details the mandatory practices for RICS Valuers, and a Red Book valuation is the recognised 'gold standard' valuation for lending, legal, probate and tax purposes.
Additionally, RICS Valuers must have appropriate geographical knowledge of the local market and be able to support their valuation with local comparatives.
TYpes of Valuation Explained
Different types of residential property valuation explained
We find that clients quite often are, understandably, confused by differing types of property valuation. There are a number of different options but the key valuations homeowners will encounter are as follows:
Market Appraisal - Estate Agent Valuation
This is a valuation by an estate agent giving advice as how to best market your property and at what level to pitch the price of the property in order to generate interest, book viewings and secure a sale.
To an extent agents are trying to predict what the market will do whilst your property is on the market – often this might be no more than an informed guess. Their appraisal value is quite often sales-orientated, and some estate agents fall into the trap of being over optimistic in order to try and secure the business.
Ultimately, this can be dangerous because if an estate agent is deliberately over valuing a property and it goes on the market at too high an asking price, often it will receive a poor response and no offers will be forthcoming. This means that it will ‘stick’ and ultimately be difficult to sell, as it will have been seen by many potential purchasers at a higher price. Consequently it may be necessary to make large cuts on the price in order to revitalise the market and rekindle interest. This can often lead to a protracted sales process and/or result in a sale at below market price.
Estate agents generally offer a market appraisal free of charge, and it is worth speaking to a few local agents to get a range of appraisal valuations. It is important to be realistic at this point and not be tempted by the higher price on offer from more bullish estate agents who might be fishing for the instruction.
Red Book Valuation
A RICS Red Book valuation, on the other hand, is a highly regulated valuation undertaken by a Chartered Surveyor and following guidance set out in the ‘Red Book’, which gives very clear ground rules for carrying out the assessment.
This valuation will be based on hard-and-fast comparable evidence of similar properties that have sold in the locality within the last 6-9 months adjusted for key features and negative elements. This valuation is therefore a professional, considered valuation not seeking to achieve anything other than to give the best estimate of what the property might sell for in the current market.
These are the types of valuation that are carried out by surveyors on behalf of a mortgage company (a “mortgage val”) where the surveyor is attempting to answer a very simple question: “what is the value of the property and is there adequate security for the loan?”
In simple terms, what this means, is the property worth enough to cover the debt if the borrower defaults? Hence the question: “is it adequate security for the loan?”
It’s also important to note that if a surveyor is carrying out a mortgage valuation, they are not acting for you, the buyer, but for the mortgage company. See also our article "Why you should get a survey".
Other purposes of a Red Book valuation would include Probate valuations, Taxation, Divorce proceedings, gifts and Trusts etc which are acceptable valuations for tax authorities or the courts.
A Red Book valuation by an RICS Registered Valuer is a professional valuation and will generally cost between £300 to £600 depending upon the value of the property.
House Valuation vs Selling Price
A RICS Red Book house valuation is inherently more conservative than an estate agent’s market appraisal as it relies heavily on actual recorded sales rather than the often rather optimistic agent’s guesstimate, and it is this that can give rise to discrepancies between lenders valuations and estate agents selling price valuations.
Banks and building societies are cautious about not having borrowers caught in a negative equity situation – not because they are being particularly altruistic and concerned about the borrower, but because in the event of repossession and subsequent forced resale, they will want to ensure that they recover the outstanding loan balance.
This is particularly the case where selling prices are predicted to fall or are actually falling, where lenders will often try and protect themselves by taking a pessimistic view of a valuation, and by not offering high loan-to-value (LTV) mortgages.
Insurance Valuation
The final type of valuation which is of interest to homeowners is the insurance valuation or the insurance rebuild cost assessment.
This often causes confusion as it is not a market valuation as such. It is effectively the estimated cost of the total replacement of the dwelling and the ancillary elements on a total loss basis, i.e. assume a Boeing 737 has landed on the house and the garden and it is the cost of reinstating the property into its form at the time of valuation.
An insurance valuation is effectively a bricks and mortar value (or cost) only and it takes no account of land value.
Land Valuation
If you were to take the Red Book valuation and deduct the insurance rebuild cost, you would end up with the value of the land, which is another type of valuation.
Land value is derived by taking the value of the final completed development (GDV) and deducting all costs to procure that development. The balance, or residual figure, is the value of the land.
We hope this gives you some insight into the various different types of valuation that are on offer to homeowners on a day-to-day basis.
How Our Site Works
How it Works
Our RICS Surveyors cover the whole of the UK. All of the surveyors or firms listed on our site are RICS Registered and Regulated - either AssocRICS, MRICS, FRICS, or RICS Regulated Firms, so you can be sure that your survey will be carried out to the highest professional standards.
Getting an estimate for a standard home survey is as simple as 1, 2, 3...
1. Enter your property details
2. Enter your contact details, and
3. Press Search - what could be simpler?
You will receive estimates for your survey from up to five RICS Surveyors operating in your postcode. These estimates and the surveyor details will be displayed on screen, and also emailed to you for you to follow up. Your details will also be sent to the listed surveyors so they can contact you to discuss your requirements in more detail.
If you need something other than a standard survey for a home purchase, then simply click on one of the 'Survey Types' options from the main menu to find a relevant surveyor.
FAQs
FAQs
I didn't get 5 results/estimates, why is that?
The maximum number of estimates you will receive is 5, and in most urban areas, for the common survey types, you will receive a full complement. But in some areas, particularly rural areas, the actual number may be fewer, depending upon the number of surveyors offering the specific service you require, as:
a) not all surveyors will offer all survey types in their chosen territories, and
b) some areas, particularly more rural areas, simply have fewer surveyors covering them!
Do quoted fees include VAT?
Yes, fees include VAT where applicable. But note not all surveyors are VAT registered, particularly independent surveyors or smaller practices who's prices will be shown without VAT.
Why are you not showing the option of a RICS Level 1 Condition Report?
The scope and work involved in the preparation of the RICS Condition Report is very similar to that of a RICS Level 2 HomeBuyer Report. It involves the same amount of travel to the property, the same visual inspection, and only a slightly less comprehensive report. Because of this, the price differential between the two report levels is insignificant, generally less than 10%. Added to this, many surveyors consider the scope of a Level 1 report to be insufficient for buyers to make a truly informed buying decision. As a result very few suveyors actively offer the Level 1 survey, preferring to only offer the Level 2 HomeBuyer report as a more appropriate alternative. Conseqently we no longer include the RICS Level 1 Condition Report as a search option on our site.
Are your surveyors all local to my postcode?
Results will list surveying firms of a mixture of sizes and locations. Some are independent practitioners, and others may be larger firms covering wider areas. Smaller firms and independent surveyors tend to be highly localised - they don't like to waste hours 'on the road' travelling between surveys!
Larger regional or semi-national firms with main offices that are located out of your immediate locality usually employ surveyors local to the postcodes they appear in for the same reason, so you can expect that the surveyor carrying out your survey for any firm appearing in your search results will have a good knowledge of your local area. Just because the main office of a surveying firm is distant from your location does not mean the actual surveyor carrying out your survey is not local!
If you are in any doubt as to the local knowledge of the surveyors returned, we'd recommend you simply ask about their experience of your locality before you choose.
Why do you ask for the postcode and address of the property?
We need your postcode to find local surveyors actively operating in the area. The full address helps surveyors answer any questions you may have based on the specific property, and its location, for which you require the survey.
Why do you ask for my contact details?
We need these to email your estimates to you, and so the surveyors can contact you to discuss your exact requirements. If you choose to withold your contact information (by entering dummy information for example) you will still be able to view your search results on screen, but they will not be emailed to you. If you prefer to be emailed but not called, simply enter 'please don't call me' or a series of zeros in the telephone number field.
Can I withhold my contact details?
You can if you wish, but if you choose to withold your contact information (by entering dummy information for example) we will not be able to email your estimates to you, although you will still be able to view your search results on screen. If you want to receive confirmation of your estimates by email but prefer not to be called, simply enter 'please don't call me' or a series of zeros in the telephone number field.
What do you do with my details?
Details of your survey estimate and the contact details you provide are are stored in our database, and sent to the surveyors shown in results so they can respond to you. They are prohibited from using your data for any other purpose.
If you tick the 'Please send me details of other services...' box we may send you additional information on our other services and products. If you do not tick the box you will not receive any further offers from us. Under no circumstances will we sell or pass your personal data to any other party - please see our privacy policy for full details.
Is your site secure?
Our website uses a Secure Socket Layer (commonly called an SSL certificate) to encrypt all data being transmitted between your browser and our webserver using the https protocol to ensure that no personal information can be intercepted. Click on the padlock in your browser address bar for details of our SSL certificate.
Are all your surveyors RICS surveyors?
Yes. All the surveyors or firms listed on our site are RICS accredited - either AssocRICS, MRICS, FRICS, or RICS Regulated Firms. Results may also return estimates for companies such as Your Survey, that provide a centralised 'outsourced' marketing, booking and administration service for individual RICS regulated surveyors.
Why is there a difference between quotes from different surveyors for the same 'standard' type of RICS survey?
Most surveyors base their fees on the amount of time taken to carry out the property inspection and prepare their final report.
They will generally include an allowance for covering their travel time and mileage to and from the property, and time to answer any follow up questions.
Although Level 1 and Level 2 surveys (RICS Condition Report and RICS HomeBuyer Report) have to meet the RICS standard minimum scope, there can be variations to that. For example, some surveyors may include more detailed photos and additional information. Although the minimum RICS specification should be met, the survey may include 'extras' that add to the cost. This variation can be more marked for Level 3 surveys (Building Surveys), where reports may be more in-depth and more customised.
Many surveyors will provide sample reports, and it is worth requesting a copy of these to compare before giving your instruction to proceed to check you are comparing 'like-with-like'.
Another factor to consider is VAT. The fees quoted on our site include VAT where applicable. However, not all surveyors are VAT registered, particularly independent surveyors with smaller practices, and that will be reflected in their quoted fee.
Are the quotes on your site binding?
No. The fees quoted on our site are estimates based on a conventional property of standard construction, so should be correct for 'normal' urban properties.
However, if properties are older, or have been modified, for example through the addition of extensions, garages, conservatories, or loft rooms etc, then there might be extra costs involved. This would particularly apply to properties that have additional outbuildings or annexes. You should always check that the surveyor is aware of these, or any specific concerns you want addressed, in order to obtain a confirmed quotation.
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