I recently found a decent home to purchase. After looking around, I saw that there is a sewage cover in the backyard. My realtor tells me: "The manhole cover in the back yard is to a 42" storm drainage pipe. It is only surface water and not sewage. It runs parallel to the sewer line in the street and has never been a problem."
Should I be worried and pass on this house? If this breaks, who will be responsible in order to fix the problem?
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It is most certainly a storm sewer, not a sanitary sewer. I have seen this sort of thing, particularly in yards with special circumstances, like on a reverse ravine lot, where the backyard goes up up up, or when there is a lot of the yard hardscaped, and therefore there is no natural runoff absorption. Another place I've seen them is when someone digs out a walkout from the basement, they use them just outside the entrance, to collect the water that will naturally run down into this area.
I would say, if you really like the house, then its worth doing a bit of investigation. Don't even bother talking to the realtor. Get a professional out to look at it for you and get on the phone with the city to find out the details. It probably is not cause for concern, but an informed buyer is a happy buyer!
We probably looked over 100 houses. None of them had this in their backyard.
I think I have one like this in my back yard. If you enlarge the picture, it's easier to see the cover which is under the fence behind the post to the right of the plant. A larger portion of the cover is in the neighbour's back yard.
The only 'problem' I can think of is if you build a structure over it or too close to it which may interfere with any work that needs doing to it by city workers. I never gave much thought to this when we bought this house in 2001. The fence was over it at that time, btw. A few years ago city workers were by to replace the cover for some reason, and since the new one sits a little higher they just made the cutout of the fence about 1/2" highter to accommodate it. It didn't bother me that they were in my yard to do this, but they may have chosen my yard since the neighbour has a shed close to it on the other side.
I would suggest you simply contact the city hall and ask about what kind of maintenance the thing gets, and ask for ideas about how having it there could adversly affect your decision about buying the property. They have maps that show 'way' areas where wires and pipes are, and they can tell you what kind of access may be needed there Ask about how upgrades in the future may effect you also.
I have a round storm water grate in my front lawn that was part of chaos that took place when the city took on storm sewere upgrading. Basically the street was dug up to accommodate larger cement 'pipes' but aside from no street parking during certain hours and haviing notices about when the water would be shut off, it didn't seem too bad. But things with the contractors went wrong, the street began flooding, a neighbour had his water cut off by accident and a gas line got cut. So, a big digger machine was in the middle of my lawn to fix this, and a tree that had to have been there for 30 years was sacrificed. The city made sure my lawn was set back to normal afterward, but my yard was definitely a casualty for a while. Once all was done, the bright side was that we now enjoy fresh pavement and new sidewalks!
This might have been put in by a previous owner. I live on a very high hill and some people have dry well systems in place that do the same job as the system you are referring to, however, I would determine who put it in to understand who is responsible. It may simply be a part of the town's water management system for water run-off. Our neighbour had to deal with this problem since he sits in a bit of a gulley. From my own experience it is a sign that there has been drainage issues and this is how they have been resolved. Usually that is not a problem, however, over time if there is a break in the pipe you need to know where the burden of responsibilty will be placed, you or the municipality.
I've never seen that around here, so I would not be interested. But maybe in your area it is normal so maybe not so bad.