You are selling in England and a buyer's Level 3 has arrived. Why must you not relabel that PDF as a Home Report for the next viewer?

What is the fuller explanation?

Level 3, in the RICS product, is the detailed home survey used for older, altered or unusual construction, or where major works are planned. It uses condition ratings. Rating 3 means serious and/or urgent. NI means not inspected. Those are useful to the client who paid for them. They are not the single survey inside a Home Report, and the property questionnaire of 16 categories is not hiding at the back of a Level 3. Putting the words Home Report on the cover does not add the missing parts, and it suggests a reliance rule that belongs to the Scottish pack.

RICS says a purchaser can rely on a Home Report. That sentence is about the Scottish document, not about a Level 3 a previous bidder commissioned in England. Handing the PDF to the next viewer under a new label implies they may rely on it as that pack. They should not be told that. You are selling in England. Ask your solicitor before you share another buyer's report at all. If you do share it, share it under its real name, with its real client, and without Scottish wording you do not have.

What should you ask your surveyor?

• Whose name is on the Level 3, and which country is the house in?
• Does the PDF contain a property questionnaire of 16 categories?
• Are you about to add the words Home Report to a file that is not one?

What are the typical next steps?

1. Keep the Level 3 under its own title.
2. Do not offer it to the next viewer as a Home Report.
3. Ask your solicitor before you circulate another buyer's report.

Costs vary with the building and with who you instruct. Where this page does not cite a published figure, ask the surveyor, a relevant specialist, or your solicitor for a written quote. Do not treat a forum average as the price.

Also asked about this

Which pages should you read next?

• Furniture with old flight holes is taken away before the survey. What has that removal not changed about the house timbers?
• A Scottish single survey comments on a tenement roof. What has it not decided about how a common repair bill is split between the flats?
• You decide to walk away before exchange in England. Which fees does that decision not automatically return?
• Guide: Should a seller in England or Wales get a survey?
• All UK home survey questions

Sources

• mygov.scot: Buying a home: Home Report
• RICS: House surveys: the costs, types and benefits of an RICS home survey
• RICS: Description of the RICS Home Survey Level 3 (condition rating definitions)