Last Updated on September 8, 2026
Your client arrives with a number. It is probably £499, and it probably came from one of two sites that publish nearly the same figure and are presented as independent datasets.
All figures read at source on 8 September 2026.
What the four publishers say
| Survey | HomeOwners Alliance | Konnect You | reallymoving | MyBuilder |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| RICS Level 1 Condition Report | £300 to £900 | average £380 | not published | £300 to £700 |
| RICS Level 2 HomeBuyer | £400 to £1,000 | average £499 | average £498.95 | £377 to £506 |
| RICS Level 3 Building Survey | £630 to £1,500 | average £656 | average £661.29 | £400 to £1,000 |
| Mortgage valuation | £112 to £1,250 | average £354 | not published | £150 to £800 |
Note the second and third columns. Konnect You publishes £499 for Level 2 and reallymoving publishes £498.95. On Level 3 they are within £5. They are presented as separate datasets from separate businesses.
Treat them as one data point, not two. If you are benchmarking, or if a client quotes both at you as corroboration, that is the thing to know.
The fourth column is the other oddity. MyBuilder’s HomeBuyer ceiling of £506 sits below the HomeOwners Alliance’s midpoint, and its Level 3 ceiling of £1,000 sits below the HomeOwners Alliance’s £1,500. MyBuilder cites no external data source on the page we read.
The banded table your client expects
The HomeOwners Alliance publishes survey cost by property value, which is the shape buyers now expect because it matches how they think:
| Property price | Level 1 | Level 2 | Level 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| £100k to £249k | £300 to £500 | £400 to £600 | £630 to £800 |
| £250k to £349k | £500 to £600 | £600 to £700 | £800 to £900 |
| £350k to £499k | £600 to £700 | £700 to £800 | £900 to £1,100 |
| £500k to £1m | £700 to £900 | £800 to £1,000 | £1,000 to £1,500 |
You do not have to agree with those numbers. You do have to answer them, because a buyer who has seen that table and gets a single unbanded quote from you assumes you are either expensive or vague.
Party wall, where two guides are suspiciously aligned
| Item | HomeOwners Alliance, 10 March 2026 | Checkatrade, June 2026 |
|---|---|---|
| Hourly rate | £90 to £450 | average £200, range £90 to £450 |
| Award, one surveyor | Around £1,000 | Around £1,000 |
| Loft conversion | £900 to £1,200 | £900 to £1,200 |
| Extension | £1,200 to £1,500 | £1,200 to £1,500 |
| Basement | £1,800 to £2,700 | £1,800 to £2,700 |
| Two surveyors | £1,800 to £5,400 | £1,800 to £5,400 |
Band for band identical. Again, that is one data point rather than independent corroboration, and Checkatrade’s page states its data is verified by CIOB and RICS professional estimators.
Quantity surveying, where no scale exists at all
RICS abolished its indicative fee scales, the last withdrawn in 2000, and Designing Buildings states plainly that there is very little benchmarking information freely available since. Its broad figure is 0.5 to 2 per cent of total contract cost, with the caveat that this varies very significantly.
The only detailed percentage table we could open is from Evolution5 and was published on 3 March 2021, which makes it five years old. It gives new build traditional contract at 3.2 per cent for a £250,000 project down to 1.9 per cent at £10m, and design and build at 3.1 per cent down to 1.5 per cent.
We are flagging its age rather than presenting it as current, and any QS quoting it should do the same.
What to publish
- A banded table: three survey levels against four property value bands. Match the shape buyers already see.
- What each level does and does not include, in plain sentences rather than by reference to the Home Survey Standard.
- Your turnaround: instruction to inspection, and inspection to report, in days.
- What is excluded: specialist reports for damp, timber, drains, asbestos and structural engineering.
- Whether a valuation is included and, if not, what one costs.
- A dated prices-checked line.
Point three is undervalued. In a transaction with a chain behind it, days matter more than pounds, and almost no firm publishes its turnaround. It is free, it is checkable against your own diary, and it is frequently the deciding factor.
Published UK figures from MyBuilder, read on 8 September 2026: structural engineer report £500 to £1,500; damp survey £200 to £300; asbestos survey £200 to £1,000; timber and damp report £250 to £400; electrical installation report £150 to £300.
Listing those, with the note that your report may recommend one, manages the expectation that a survey is the end of the spending. Clients who are surprised by a follow-on cost blame the surveyor.
Common questions
How much does a house survey cost in the UK?
Published averages for a RICS Level 2 HomeBuyer report cluster around £499, though the two sources publishing that figure are within five pence of each other and should be treated as one data point. The HomeOwners Alliance publishes a wider £400 to £1,000, banded by property value.
Is a Level 3 building survey worth the extra?
That depends on the property’s age, condition and alterations, which is exactly the page most firms do not write. Published price differences run from a couple of hundred pounds at the bottom of the market to several hundred at the top.
Why should a surveying firm publish prices?
Because the buyer has already seen a banded table from a comparison site. Publishing yours moves the conversation onto your numbers and your turnaround, which is the ground you actually compete on.
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