Frequently asked questions
Do you travel outside of your immediate area?
We travel across the UK to provide clients with a clear and insightful report on their property. Too often are building surveys created using pre-formatted text and drop-down boxes on site. We started Russet and Sage to improve the quality of surveys and aim to produce genuinely helpful report to support clients in understanding the condition of their property or a potential purchase.
What is a Level 2 Survey?
A Level 2 survey comprises of desktop research which delves into the property's location, planning, EPC certificate, historic context/mapping as well as geographical and topographical information and flood risks. All of this information is relevant to understanding a building fully and this research is carried out before the inspection date. The inspection itself is visual and identifies both defects (things that have gone wrong) and deficiencies (things that haven't necessarily gone wrong but aren't of a standard expected). The report provided provides a concise summary of all of this information, prioritises and clearly defines both the actions that are required to remedy the issues and where appropriate, informs you of who you should use to help you (described by trade not by person/company).
What is different about a Level 3 Survey?
A Level 3 Survey includes all of the same research and inspection as a Level 2 but provides more detail in the report. A Level 3 Survey will describe the relevant building pathology and give context and background to the more complicated issues. This level of survey aims to explain to the client what is important and why.
What about a Heritage Building Survey?
​Many Level 3 Surveys carried out on historic buildings understandably focus on condition and defects, but can give limited attention to issues such as the appropriateness of materials both internally and externally, longer-term risks arising from incremental change, and the identification of historic features that may not be immediately obvious, including early fabric or culturally significant markings. Guidance on ratifying issues are conservation minded and stem from a background in heritage crafts.
Our Heritage Building Survey is designed to address the gap between craft and building surveys. It follows the scope of a Level 3 Survey, but the report is specifically geared towards buildings of traditional construction, placing greater emphasis on how the building has evolved, how it behaves, and how it can be sensibly managed over the long term.
The aim is not simply to record defects, but to provide clear, proportionate guidance that helps owners understand what should be protected, what requires attention, and why.
What happens after I receive the report if I still have questions?
We offer an opportunity to discuss the findings of the report, after you have had a chance to read it.. The reports are natuarally quite large and we are here to help you to digest them fully.
How do I know what is urgent and what I need to do?
Our reports are colour coded on a traffic light system of urgency which is an RICS feature you would find in most RICS reports. However we also clearly highlight all of the actions that have been recommended to make navigating and understand the report as easy as possible. We have also created our own bespoke report templates that are aimed specifically at making the report as easy to navigate as possible.