Earlier this year, on 10 February 2025, a High Court ruling on the sale of a London mansion made headlines due to the thousands of resident houseguests which, unbeknownst to its millionaire buyers, came en masse with the house: moths. 

The case offers significant lessons to homeowners going through the process of selling their property. It is worth brushing up on exactly what your obligations are when responding to Commercial Property Standard Enquiries (CPSEs) in order to avoid expensive consequences further down the track.  

Case Summary 

Patarkatsishvili and another v Woodward-Fisher centres on the purchase of a £32.5 million Notting Hill home by the Claimants, Iya Patarkatsishvili and Yehven Hunyak, from the Defendant, Mr Woodward-Fisher.  

Despite multiple pre-purchase visits and careful enquiries, shortly after moving in, the Claimants were confronted with a debilitating clothes moth infestation. It was revealed that the Defendant’s wife had received pest control reports relating to the infestation in advance of the sale. The Defendant’s assertion during the enquiries that he was not aware of any issues with vermin at the property was therefore found to be knowingly false, and the Court determined there had been fraudulent misrepresentation.  

As a result, the Court ruled that the contract for the purchase should be rescinded, meaning that the Defendant must buy the property back from the Claimants, and must pay them additional damages for their losses, including money spent on pest control and loss of enjoyment of their home.  

Key takeaways: What to be aware of when responding to CPSEs 

1. If you are going to respond, you need to respond honestly. If this is not appealing, the option to decline to answer is available – it may jeopardise the sale, but this is preferable to being hit with a multi-million pound claim after the fact. The judgment in this case reiterates that sellers retain the right not to answer enquiries, provided that it does not make any information provided to the buyer misleading or incomplete.
2. You do not need to know for definite that a statement is untrue for it to be considered false for the purposes of misrepresentation. Recklessness as to the truth will also constitute a false statement in this context, i.e. where the maker of the statement neither knows nor cares if the statement is true and consciously runs the risk that it could be false. 
3. Even if the buyers don’t read your responses themselves, you may still be on the hook. Giving a response to a buyer’s solicitor is treated as though you have told the buyer directly, even if they never actually read it. 
4. Recission could be ordered even where it is ostensibly ‘impossible’. This means that, even where the seller does not actually have the money to buy back the property, they could be ordered to do so. In this case, the Claimants will retain a lien over the property once it is transferred back to the seller for the outstanding debt owed to them. 
5. And a final, more niche, takeaway - the definition of ‘vermin’ is broad! It was decided that insects can constitute vermin for the purpose of pre-contract enquiries, and Mr Woodward-Fisher was not able to sidestep the claim on this basis. 

Sellers should therefore take pre-contract enquiries seriously and respond honestly and with consideration. The principle of caveat emptor (“buyer beware”) will not be enough to protect sellers whose answers are found to be false, or worse, dishonest.