Cases - Allen v Ellis & Co

Record details

Name
Allen v Ellis & Co
Date
[1990]
Citation
11 EG 78
Legislation
Keywords
Negligence in valuations and surveys
Summary

The defendants carried out a full building survey for the claimant purchaser of a pre-war detached house. They were held negligent for describing the property's detached garage as 'brick built in nine-inch brickwork and in satisfactory condition', when it was in fact built of breeze block and had a 50-year old corrugated asbestos roof that was brittle, fragile and in need of replacement. A year after moving in, the purchaser stood on the roof to investigate a leak, fell through it and was injured. It was held, somewhat surprisingly, that what the purchaser had done was a foreseeable consequence of the surveyor's negligence, and the surveyor was liable for his injuries.