Q When I bought my house, the estate agent's marketing literature stated that the property was double- glazed. After I moved in, I found that it had single glazing. The agent claims that I have no recourse to compensation because I signed the purchase contract. Is this right?

A Estate agents have long suffered from the reputation that their property particulars are little more than hyperbole and half-truths. However, this kind of problem is now very rare indeed. One reason is that the Property Misdescription Act 1991 made it a criminal offence for an estate agent to give out incorrect property details. The Act covers 33 prescribed matters relating to any property, including location, address, size, measurements, fixtures and fittings and physical and structural characteristics. The restrictions in the Act extend to any oral statement by the sales agent, any photographs in the agent's window and any material on its website. Given that estate agents can be found guilty of using a false description even if they did so accidentally, most now refuse to provide anything but the barest minimum information about a property in their written particulars. They may also use a written disclaimer in the small print - but that will usually be ineffective in law. Any complaint under the Act is handled by the local authority's trading standards officer, who can bring a prosecution in the magistrates' court within a year.

It is true that it is not up to the sellers to point out defects with the property. The ancient principle of caveat emptor (let the buyer beware) applies. However, if the sellers do volunteer a statement of fact that is untrue, this is actionable as a misrepresentation. In your case, the pre-contract inquiries served by your solicitor before exchange of contracts will usually have asked whether the sales particulars were correct. If the sellers answered that the particulars were correct, they will have made a misrepresentation. However, damages would typically be only the difference between what you paid for the house and what it was worth without double-glazing.

My advice is to persuade the trading standards officer to prosecute the agent under the Property Misdescription Act. If he secures a conviction, you can use this to claim damages against the sellers for misrepresentation.

The writer is a barrister at Tanfield Chambers. E-mail your questions to: brief.encounter@thetimes.co.uk

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