After the survey
Should you renegotiate, or walk away?
A serious rating is a reason to get written prices, not an automatic instruction to walk away or demand a fixed discount. RICS tells buyers to obtain quotations for rating 3 repairs before they are legally committed. Your solicitor, not the surveyor, changes the price. Walk away when the unknown risk is larger than you can carry.
Last reviewed 24 October 2026. Written for buyers in England and Wales unless a source says otherwise. No named surveyor has signed this page. It is general guidance, not a report on your house, and not legal advice.
What can a survey change, and what can it not?
A RICS Home Survey describes condition. It does not rewrite the price, and it does not end the contract. In England and Wales you can usually walk away before exchange, but the words of your reservation, lock-out or conditional contract might say otherwise. Ask your solicitor before you assume withdrawal is free. After exchange, walking away is a legal problem, not a survey problem. That is why RICS talks about quotations before legal commitment.
Sellers price houses as they appear, not as they open up. A survey that finds a failed flat roof or live movement is new information. A survey that says the bathroom is dated is not. Renegotiation is for the first kind of finding. Using a rating 2 on tired decorations to reopen a price you already thought was fair is how buyers lose credibility, and sometimes the house.
When is it reasonable to renegotiate?
It is reasonable when you can point to a defect the surveyor calls serious or urgent, or a repair they say is needed, and you have a written price for it. The usual request is a reduction, or for the seller to do the work to an agreed standard before completion. A reduction is often cleaner, because you control the repair. Work done by the seller in a hurry, the week of completion, is how leaks get painted over.
It is weaker when the item is ordinary maintenance a rating 2 has already classed as not serious or urgent, and you saw it on the viewing. It is weaker still when you have no quote and are asking for a round percentage because the report “felt bad”. Percentages are not a RICS method. There is no official “rating 3 equals five percent” rule. Anyone who sells you one is inventing it.
When is walking away the clearer decision?
Walk away, or at least do not exchange, when the thing that matters is still unknown and the seller will not give time or access to find out. A rating 3 that says “possible structural movement, cause not established, instruct an engineer” is not ready for a price chip. It is ready for an engineer. If the seller refuses that investigation, you are being asked to buy the uncertainty. Some buyers can carry that. Most should not pretend a small discount has paid for it.
Other honest reasons to stop: the quoted works are larger than the money you have after the deposit; a specialist has confirmed a problem your lender will not fund; or the report shows the level of repair is a project you did not want. None of these is a formula. They are the point of reading the report before you are committed. Staying is also a valid outcome. Plenty of rating 3 chimneys are repaired every year by people who bought the house with their eyes open.
How do you put the request so it can be answered?
Give your solicitor three things: the surveyor’s paragraph, not a retelling; the quote or specialist letter; and the outcome you want, which is a price, a retention, or agreed works. Leave the tone to the solicitor. A long letter about how disappointed you are is not evidence. If you use a decoder to turn the report into plain English, keep the original sentence attached. Negotiating from a summary you cannot trace is how numbers get detached from the defect.
This site can lay the findings out as a pack your solicitor can read. It cannot tell you the right price, and it will not tell you the house is fine if the report does not.
How do you decide whether to renegotiate or walk away?
A practical sequence for a buyer in England and Wales who has a RICS Home Survey and has not yet exchanged contracts. It is not legal advice.
- Separate the ratings. List every condition rating 3, every further-investigation line, and every NI that covers the roof, structure, damp or services. Park rating 1. Treat rating 2 as maintenance you may or may not ask the seller to share, not as urgency.
- Price the known work. Get written quotations for rating 3 repairs before you are legally committed, which is what RICS tells buyers to do. A quote is a number. A colour on a chart is not.
- Investigate the unknowns. Where the surveyor says further investigation, instruct that specialist rather than a second general survey. Do not invent a discount for a cause nobody has established.
- Ask through your solicitor. Send the solicitor the paragraphs, the quotes and the specialist reports. They put any price change, retention or withdrawal to the seller. The surveyor does not negotiate the deal.
- Decide what you can carry. Stay if the known cost is priced and acceptable. Renegotiate if the seller will share a known cost. Walk away if a serious risk is still unpriced or the seller will not allow the investigation the report asked for.
Common questions
Is there a standard percentage to ask off after a survey?
No. RICS does not publish one, and neither does the law of England and Wales. A sound request is based on a written quotation for a defined defect, or on a specialist’s findings. A round percentage with no quote is a haggle, and the seller can ignore it. We will not invent a typical discount.
What if the seller says it is just wear and tear?
Ask whether the surveyor’s rating agrees. A rating 2 that RICS defines as not serious or urgent often is the sort of wear a seller means. A rating 3, with a quote, is not “just old”. Point at the definition and the price. If they still refuse, you decide whether you can pay for the work yourself.
Should the seller do the works, or reduce the price?
A price reduction leaves you in control of who repairs the house and to what standard. Seller’s works can be right for something that must be safe before completion, if the specification and the invoices are clear. Either way, your solicitor writes it down. A verbal promise to “sort the roof” is not a repair.
What is a retention?
A retention is money held back at completion until agreed work is done. It is a legal mechanism your solicitor and the lender have to be willing to use. It is not something a surveyor arranges. It only helps if the work, the sum and the deadline are defined. A vague retention against “damp” tends to sit in an account and argue with you.
Can you renegotiate after exchange?
Do not plan to. Exchange is the legal commitment. RICS’s rating 3 wording is aimed at the period before that commitment. After exchange, a new defect is a question for your solicitor and the contract, not a fresh survey negotiation. This is not legal advice. Ask the person who is acting on the contract.
What if the lender asks for a retention but you were happy to proceed?
The lender’s valuation is separate from your Home Survey. They can require works, a retention, or a specialist report as a condition of the loan even when you would buy anyway. You can sometimes bridge their retention with cash. Your broker or solicitor explains the offer. The surveyor does not overrule the lender.
Should you add up every rating 2 and send the total?
You can price them for your own budget. Sending the seller a shopping list of tired ironmongery rarely works, and it can bury the one rating 3 you actually need them to answer. Lead with the serious or unpriced items. Keep the maintenance list as your cost of owning the house.
Is any price reduction after a survey gazundering?
Gazundering is a last-minute cut that is not justified by a change in the property. A reduction tied to a defect the survey found, with a quote, is a renegotiation. A cut you were always going to attempt, with the survey as decoration, is the thing sellers mean by the word. The difference is the evidence in the letter.
What if you love the house and the report is grim?
Liking the house does not change a rating. It changes what risk you are willing to fund. Price the rating 3s, do the investigations, and then decide with the numbers in front of you. Walking away from a house you love is allowed. So is buying it with a larger repair fund than you planned. Buying it and hoping the surveyor was being dramatic is the option the ratings were invented to prevent.
Sources
Key facts
- Rating 3
- RICS: obtain written quotations before legal commitment. Not an instruction to withdraw.
- Who negotiates
- Your solicitor or conveyancer. The surveyor reports on condition.
- A fair ask
- A share of a known, quoted, defect that was not obvious when you offered. Not a refund for ordinary rating 1 maintenance.
- Walking away
- Most serious when investigation is refused, or the risk cannot be priced before exchange. This is not a rule of law. It is a judgement.
- This page
- General information, not legal advice. Contract terms decide whether you can withdraw without cost.