Selling Without a FENSA Certificate

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Fenestration Self-Assessment Scheme certificates demonstrate that door or window installations at your freehold or leasehold property comply with all relevant UK government building regulations. If your home doesn’t have this certificate, it can be more difficult to find a buyer for the property, but there are still steps you can take in order to secure a fast sale.

1. What is a FENSA certificate?
2. How can the lack of a FENSA certificate affect selling a home?
3. Having your home without a FENSA certificate inspected
4. Getting indemnity insurance instead of a FENSA certificate
5. What’s the fastest way to sell a home without a FENSA certificate?
6. Top questions about selling a property that lacks a FENSA certificate

What is a FENSA certificate?

Having a FENSA certificate can often be crucial when trying to sell your freehold or leasehold house or flat because, in simple terms, it is proof for potential buyers, mortgage lenders and others that any door or window installations you had done were completed properly.

FENSA is short for the Fenestration Self-Assessment Scheme, which the UK government created in April 2002 and is scheme "that monitors building regulation compliance for replacement windows and doors, " according to FENSA’s website.

The government created FENSA to ensure that homeowners are complying with building regulations when replacing or for the first time installing doors and windows. FENSA has a list of approved installers, ranging from small independent contractors to larger national companies, and it oversees this work to make sure that it meets FENSA’s requirements along with some thermal standards.

FENSA continually assesses its approved installers to ensure that they are meeting those standards, and when work is completed, an installer issues a certificate to the homeowner stating that the door or window installation complies with FENSA’s standards.

This document is then the best possible proof for home loan lenders, prospective buyers and the current property owner to show that the installation can be trusted as meeting building regulations. These certificates are backed with a 10-year guarantee, and they are typically valid for the duration of the windows or doors for which they were issued.

How can the lack of a FENSA certificate affect selling a home?

If your property does not have a FENSA certificate, it can create concerns among potential buyers and mortgage lenders about whether the windows and doors comply with building regulations, as many FENSA-approved installers note on their websites.

Any windows that you have had replaced by a professional from April 1, 2002, onward are strictly required to have a FENSA certificate to demonstrate that the work complies with all relevant requirements, or you can alternatively show this with a building regulations certificate.

Whichever type of certificate you have, you must understand that it is against the law to have double glazing installed in any type of home without also having either of them in place. You could be liable for prosecution and significant fines for failing to obtain a certificate.

Trying to sell a home without a FENSA certificate can make it hard, or impossible, for a buyer to obtain a loan to cover the cost of purchasing your property. Lenders might be wary about problems associated with your home not complying with building regulations. They could fear that this will make the house or flat impossible to sell in the event the buyer defaults on their mortgage, and the lender has to resell the home to recoup their costs.

Although the lack of a FENSA certificate might therefore cause some lenders to see the property as unmortgageable, don’t worry that you will never be able to sell the property in this situation.

As elaborated on throughout this guide, there are steps that you can take to either obtain a FENSA certificate before trying to sell, or pursue alternative methods such as selling your home a fast buyer like the London-based LDN Properties. These companies make fast and fair offers to buy almost any variety of home, including those that do not have FENSA certificates.

Having your home without a FENSA certificate inspected

Ideally, if you are preparing to have install windows or doors at your property, you would look for a FENSA-approved company that will be able to do the work and then charge you for a certificate that will show your property complies with all of the applicable requirements.

If your house or flat does not have a FENSA certificate and you would still like to proceed with selling the property, you have a few options to potentially move ahead with this process. You can read the UK Government guide to selling a home which may also be useful.

Because you’re the homeowner, one option can be to get your home reviewed by a professional inspector who might be able to issue a finding that the installation is in compliance with building regulations. You can do this by getting in touch with your local planning authority and asking them to help you with getting a retrospective building regulation certificate that shows your home is in compliance.

Just note that this process can take a long time, potentially adding months on to the selling process if you plan on obtaining this certificate before you attempt to find a buyer and may be costly.

Another way to have your home certified as being in compliance with building regulations is to organise a visit from a building control officer, who will inspect the installation of doors and windows at your home to determine if they meet government standards. If so, you’ll be issued a certificate stating this, which you can then use to demonstrate compliance to buyers.

However, this can also be a lengthy process during the time that you arrange a visit from the officer, and they will also make you pay a fee for the work involved with inspecting your home.

Getting indemnity insurance instead of a FENSA certificate

As an alternative to getting your home inspected and issued with an official declaration to satisfy FENSA requirements, you might want to consider purchasing indemnity insurance.

This insurance policy will cost you money but it has the benefit of ensuring that the policy will pay for any costs that might occur if an enforcement case is taken against the property because the doors or windows were installed in a way that didn’t comply with building regulations. It’s important to note that this insurance can only be obtained for work that’s more than a year old.

What’s the fastest way to sell a home without a FENSA certificate?

If you’re looking to sell your house or flat without taking any steps to obtain a FENSA certificate, the last major decision you will have to make before finding a buyer is selecting how to sell.

Typically, the choices are selling to a fast property buyer, selling at an auction, selling with an estate agent, or selling on your own. Each of the four methods is outlined in detail below, highlighting the fact that they all have unique advantages compared to the others. But there are also some significant cons linked with a few of the choices, as this guide explains.

To help you in determining which approach is right for your situation, write a budget for the sale of your property that includes key facts such as how long you’re willing to wait to sell, whether you’re prepared to pay any commission when selling, and relevant information. Compare this against the four methods below in order to find the one that best matches your requirements.

Selling to a fast property buyer

Perhaps the speediest way to sell your home is using a fast property buyer, because they can generally complete the purchase of any type of home within a handful of weeks, and that includes the time it takes to exchange contracts and pay owners the sale proceeds.

The reason why they’re able to complete the purchase of properties so quickly is that they have sufficient funds available for buying homes without having to wait possibly many weeks or months to initially get approved for a mortgage that would pay for the transaction. That’s much faster than the usual schedule involved with selling via the three other methods below.

These companies are also able to consider making competitive and swift offers for almost any home no matter its age, condition, shape or size – including properties without FENSA certificates. Some other examples of the many different homes that fast buyers can buy are listed buildings, houses where the owner has misplaced important documents such as the title deeds, properties built from concrete or other non-standard construction materials, lock-up garages, homes with subsidence, flats on noisy city centre streets, and other situations.

Fast buyers can be a good resource for homeowners who are looking to sell in a hurry, no matter the reason, because they provide a streamlined, no-hassle and stress-free way to obtain a sale speedily and hopefully generate funds to address whatever their situation might be.

For example, LDN Properties has been buying homes throughout the UK since 2003 and has offered their services to owners who are trying to downsize their home, attempting to prevent repossession of their current property, dealing with an illness in the family or other difficult personal situation, selling an inherited but unwanted home, needing funds to pay for a move overseas, and other scenarios. LDN Properties can also help if you are looking to sell a park home.

And often the reputable quick buying companies never charge owners any commission for selling their property, which means they can keep the full proceeds. Compare that to estate agents or auctioneers who will charge fees to sell a home, which will increase the costs of selling.

You can visit the website of The Property Ombudsman (TPO), which is a third party entity that writes policies designed to shield owners from falling victim to scams in the quick buying industry. On TPO’s website, click on the “Find a Member” tab on the left side of the main page and then type in the name of a fast buying company. If they’re genuinely registered with TPO, you’ll next see their membership details, and if they’re not part of the organisation, you won’t get any results from your search.

Selling at an auction

For a certain group of homeowners, property auctions remain a popular choice according to Property Reporter, even though they are effectively a gamble in terms of the sale price you may get for your home.

When you auction a home, you’ll be asked to choose a reserve price, which is the cheapest value at which you’re comfortable with selling your property. Be sure to choose a price that accounts for the fact you will have to pay the auctioneer their fees from the proceeds, because if you only get one bid at that price it might not be enough to avoid selling at a loss.

Auctioneers usually charge commission as a percentage a property’s final sale price, although this amount can sometimes be higher or lower. Consider asking individual companies if they might be open to negotiating a reduced fee in order to cut your costs with selling.

The auctioneer will charge this commission so that they can profit from the sale of your home, and also to cover their costs in selling it – such as preparing and advertising a listing, which will feature photographs of your property and a description of its main features.

It’s possible you’ll be given the choice between a modern auction, where your listing is live for a set number of weeks and people can place bids 24 hours a day, seven days a week, or a traditional auction, where the auction occurs on a set day and for a limited amount of time.

You may not get any bids on your property, which means it does not sell, and you’ll have to being again with trying to find a buyer, adding much more time to the process. Ideally, many people will bid on your home with ever-increasing bids that drive the sale price up.

But auctioneers might struggle to sell a home without a FENSA certificate, because many buyers could see this as a “problem” property. Ask specific auctioneers to tell you their track record of success with selling homes that don’t have a FENSA certificate. If they have never sold such a home, they could find it difficult to get buyers interested in your property.

Even if they can sell your property, this is not a fast process, because there’s at least a few weeks or longer between when you list the home for sale and when the auction occurs, and then if it sells, the buyer has about 28 days to complete all of their steps to finalise the purchase.

Some auctioneers may give the buyer less or more time to do these tasks, so you should ask the company that you choose if they’d be open to setting a speedier deadline.

Selling with an estate agent

You may be thinking about selling your home through an estate agent, a process that can often take many months, and in some worst case scenarios may last for more than a full year. As a result, this method of trying to find a buyer is often considered to be one of the slowest.

There are several steps involved that explain the time involved, beginning with the estate agent creating a listing for your flat or house and advertising it in their office, online, and in local newspapers and other media. Next, they will arrange and usually lead viewings where potential buyers get to tour the interior and exterior of your property. And finally, they will hear offers from people interested in your home, ideally seeing one of those through to exchange of contracts.

Although this can minimise your workload with selling, estate agents will make you pay them commission for the effort they put in to finding a buyer. The commission is taking out of the sale proceeds immediately, which will add to your costs when selling.

You should ask individual estate agents if they have managed to sell homes that lack FENSA certificates previously, because any company that has not found a buyer for such a property in the past might find it difficult to sell your home. As detailed in this guide, many typical private buyers could be wary about purchasing a property that does not have a FENSA certificate, and they may not even consider making an offer on yours in that situation.

Therefore, it may take even longer than a year to find a buyer when selling through an estate agent, which is far from a good outcome for anyone looking to sell their home as fast as possible. If that’s your situation, you should look at other options if your priority is getting a fast sale. For example, quick property buyers can usually complete the purchase of a house or flat within just a handful of weeks, and that includes exchanging contracts and paying buyers the process – making them often the speediest choice for trying to sell any type of home.

Some estate agents might quote an elevated price for selling your home without a FENSA certificate, even if they know that you’ll only be able to attract a buyer at a much lower price. They do this in order to secure your sale, so that they can charge you commission if they find a buyer. But thankfully it is fairly easy to avoid falling for this particular estate agent trick.

Ask several estate agents for free quotes on the price they think you can achieve for your property. Next, visit home sales websites like Rightmove and Zoopla and write down the past and current sale prices of other properties like yours that do not have FENSA certificates. Then calculate the average of all these values, and that will give you a much more accurate estimate of the potential price at which you might be able to attract buyers for your property.

Selling on your own

Yet another choice for selling your home is doing so on your own, which means that you will have to pursue all of the time-consuming and costly work of trying to find a buyer – such as making and advertising a listing, organising viewings, and fielding any offers.

This is a large undertaking and can be very stressful, and therefore it should only be considered if you have had experience with selling properties in the past, or have an experienced friend or family member who might be willing to help. Otherwise, you can expect this method of selling to take a very long time, and it might be more than a year before you receive a serious offer.

Selling this way does have the benefit of not having to pay a third party – like an auctioneer or estate agent – any commission, which would otherwise add to your costs. But you can get this same no-fee outcome, and with none of the stress involved with selling on your own, when you sell to a quick home buyer, because most companies will never charge you commission.

Top queries and answers about selling without a FENSA certificate

If you’re wanting to sell your house quickly, you may have a few questions that need answering ranging from the condition your property needs to be in before selling through to selling without a structural warranty. Here are a few of the questions we’re asked about selling without a FENSA certificate: