What to do about permit issues from before I bought my house?
October 4, 2019 2:00 AM   Subscribe

Homeowner nightmare - what should I do about very extensive roof work done without a permit from before I bought my house, in 2007?

This is in Pittsburgh, PA.

I bought my house in 2011. The previous owner had died a year or two earlier and I believe it was being sold by his estate. He was a "unique" guy and liked to DIY.

A year ago, I was contacted by the Permit department of the city about a 2007 permit for work in the basement that had never been inspected. Luckily the work was fine but when the inspector was in the basement they found other issues that we had to fix.

Now, I received another letter from the city about roof work that had not been included on another permit from 2006 or 2007. Some of the work had been included on the architectural plans but apparently the previous owner decided to keep going and not tell the city about it. Everything is visible from the exterior of our house and the unpermitted work includes an entire roof deck (!).

I spoke with the city and they said that we would have to provide full architectural plans for this new work, get permission from the local neighborhood association to have the roof deck, and fix anything that is not up to code.

This is an absolute expensive nightmare. These outstanding permit issues are more than a decade old and years before we bought our house. We were not told about any of this during the homebuying process. I had never bought a house before and did not even think about going to the permit department and asking about unresolved issues.

I have no idea what to do next. Any advice would be gratefully received.

I'm happy to add more details if necessary.
posted by amicamentis to Home & Garden (12 answers total) 4 users marked this as a favorite
 
Did you obtain title insurance when you bought the house? At least in Ontario, these sorts of issues are often covered by purchasers' title insurance policies to some extent.
posted by as_night_falls at 3:57 AM on October 4, 2019 [8 favorites]


Set up a few meetings with local contractors to price out your next steps. It might not be as expensive as you think if the work is up to code, but prepare yourself for the possibility that you’re going to have to demo the roof deck.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 4:04 AM on October 4, 2019


Ugh, what a nightmare. I'm sorry you're going through this.

Going back to the terms of the sale, I'd take a look at the selling documents and appraisal documents to see if anything was disclosed as unpermitted work or if the house was being sold As-is. In an ideal state you would've been aware of work that was unpermitted and got the house for a price appropriately discounted to account for the risk you were taking for the unpermitted work and the exact situation you're in now.

- I'd next contact your real estate agent (if you had one) and ask what can be done in this situation - in some cases the seller might be roped in to help out with costs but that potentially gets into a legal work and yours is complicated by whether the estate has anymore assets to give.

- From there - you now have to treat the roof deck and go through the process like you were building a new one. Talk to an architect and your neighborhood association rep about process.

Get drawings of the existing, bring it to the permitting office for them to review and point out places that need to be corrected, draft up new design plans that include the corrections, get it approved, get on your local neighborhold approval agenda for a vote, probably file again the permit office. Then talk to a contractor for corrections. You may also be looking at long term a new assessment to ensure the unpermitted work is included for taxes and your mortgage/insurance.

The easiest, but likely most expensive, route is to talk to a design/build firm which handles the whole process end to end.
posted by Karaage at 4:09 AM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]


1. Title insurance typically covers issues relating to the validity of ownership of the land, not the quality of the home.
2. Looking at the selling documents or considering a claim against the seller is a non-starter. If the seller was an estate, the estate wlll now be closed and no claims could be made. The beneficiaries of the estate would not be responsible for any claims.
3. Consultation with a real estate lawyer is the best idea as a beginning point.
posted by megatherium at 5:11 AM on October 4, 2019 [3 favorites]


Is the issue that work was done without a permit that should have been permitted? Or is it that work was included on the permit but then never inspected?

I agree that you should review your closing documents and disclosures. You should consider a real estate lawyer for at least a consultation about what they view your options to be. You should also go down to the city, request a meeting with someone who can be very clear about what you need to do. Keep talking with the city and try not to get too worked up with them (hard, I know). But if you can make a friend, you can often find a shortcut.

The roof deck - does this mean there’s a deck for standing on that is over a roof? What’s under the roof? Garage or living space or what? If it’s a garage or carport, you could consult with an engineer about how it was constructed and whether it is safe or if there is an easy retrofit. They can prepare a drawing in that case and calculations. Call the neighborhood association and see what the story is there. If it’s active, surely someone noticed this work and maybe there was a conversation about it. Basically, go through the cheap/free steps and see what shakes out.
posted by amanda at 5:40 AM on October 4, 2019


Also, I’ll throw this out there, if it’s an item that is removable, sometimes removing it is the least bad option in terms of cost and headache.
posted by amanda at 5:48 AM on October 4, 2019 [4 favorites]


If you bought this house from an estate in 2011, the estate is closed and there is no recourse from the seller. Hiring a real estate attorney would probably be a waste of your money unless you were interested in using them to navigate the permitting office of your jurisdiction. In Chicago, we have people who are permit expediters that are like lobbyists, so that's an option if you have money to throw at this problem.

Your likely best course of action is to explain the situation in bleak terms ("I bought this house in 2011 with clear inspection reports, the seller lied to me, and now the seller is dead.") Then ask the permitting office, "What is the cheapest legal way I can resolve this permit issue?" The answer might be to simply remove an element and have an ugly house for a while until you can resolve the aesthetic issue. But don't take "I don't know" or "go ask a contractor" for an answer. You want an actionable task that will result in your house being up to code. How can you follow the code or ask a contractor to do so if you are not told clearly what it takes to fix it?

Then scrape together savings and/or start a GoFundMe to cover the cost. Your real estate purchase is a matter of public record, including the name of the seller. It's not a secret, and it's not slanderous to mention it if you are describing facts.
posted by juniperesque at 6:21 AM on October 4, 2019 [6 favorites]


One other suggestion: find an attorney who is familiar with the zoning and permitting regulations in your area. There are rules and a process for making significant modifications to a home. It sounds like the roof deck is something that you would normally need a special permit for. In any case, you need to find someone who knows the rules and ideally who knows the individual inspectors and board members who will be making the decisions about your case.

That's where I would start. You should be able to get a sense where you stand from a relatively short consultation (an hour or two, or even less). That would let you decide how to proceed.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 7:11 AM on October 4, 2019 [3 favorites]


It's mostly an automated process for them to issue these sorts of letters and they have no idea about your situation. The municipality were likely unaware of the changes and either that recent inspection or a canvas discovered the error. So even if you had went and asked there wasn't a red flag on your file. And you wouldn't have to ask - outstanding permit issues would have blocked the sale from even happening. And while they will not find your problem novel - the muni might have special funds like a low/no interest loan program for people in your situation. Title insurance won't cover this (it just isn't an issue related to who owns what property), and I don't think lawyer will be able to find any leverage here. Yesterday you where cool, today you have this letter- the seller spent your cash a decade ago.

The three issues in that letter appear to be:
  1. full architectural plans for this new work
  2. get permission from the local neighborhood association to have the roof deck
  3. fix anything that is not up to code.
So the good news is that they didn't find you noncompliant or make any claims that anything is actually bad or wrong. That would be a much different letter full of deadlines and pointy fingers. Those three steps you got are the normal process for making an addition and they want you to do the steps and get the approval and then they've done their job. And so now it's your problem, and I have inherited similar problems (S!!) at least they gave you the better part of a decade.

To address 1 & 3 you get the addition inspected and drawn up by a firm that your city recommends/approves. Karaagepretty much has the process. I couldn't find a list online, but the permit process indicates they have a list somewhere of such people who can take a look at your project and give you the necessary paperwork. Usually I am all for DIY, but I wouldn't encourage following up a DIY project with more DIY. This firm will guide you and should be able to provide a frank assessment of what your options are to fix or remove.

Depending on your perspective this step can seem expensive for someone to draw you a nice picture, but right now that addition posses a real liability to you (and your previous ignorance of that fact would not get you far in court) or, think of it as a fee to make the inspector go away. Feel very free to abuse the timeframe a bit - you can slow walk this for ages.

#2 HOA. Well. I hate them so much. It would be very difficult for them to reject something that has been on your house for a decade. I would just approach them and ask permission, just a "hey the previous guy didn't get permission for this and I'm the sort of person that always does the right thing so here we are doing the right thing..."
posted by zenon at 12:10 PM on October 4, 2019 [2 favorites]


To clarify my initial comment regarding title insurance: I am a lawyer practising in Ontario and have worked on a number of cases where similar issues (in particular, open building permits that could not be closed without extensive rectification work and further inspections) were covered by the homeowner's title insurance. Of course, I don't know anything about typical title insurance policies in Pennsylvania specifically, but I thought it would be worth mentioning nonetheless.
posted by as_night_falls at 2:18 PM on October 4, 2019 [3 favorites]


One other thought- non code compliant building elements which have been in place as long as these have been may be "grandfathered in" as existing, non-conforming parts of the structure. This depends greatly on where you're located and may not be relevant to your particular situation, I'm just mentioning it in case it applies. It does seem really odd that the building department is coming after you after such a long time. Any idea what put you on their radar?
posted by Larry David Syndrome at 2:48 PM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]


get a contractor, go to the local authorities work it out.....if this issue was disclosed to you at sale it's on you, if not you may have some sort of recourse as far as back fines etc.....
posted by patnok at 4:50 PM on October 4, 2019


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