Help with my Sister In Laws house survey.... *LINK*

[Anonymous]

Blimey these questions are rolling in now.
My Sister in Law has had a survey come back on a house she put an offer in on.
One of the major items is damp.
You can see the house on the link.
It has 225mm solid brick walls with signs of bitumous damp proof course. There is high reading of damp to most of the rear rooms. It may be caused by the fact that some render has been applied to the lower part of the wall, and has in fact gone below the DPC.
I have searched the past posts to see if there are any links to extra reading on this, but have drawn a blank.
Can any give me any advice I can pass on to her?
Obviously a damp expert would solve the problem, but what sort of damp expert should I get in? The house next door seems to have had a damp problem, as it has the drilled and filled holes, which I'm sure has a proper name!!!!!!!

Anything else I should tell her to look at?

The electrics need doing, but we new that. Repointing in places is dodgy, so that needs removing and repointing again.

Cheers

Graham



Old house with damp!!!

 

[Anonymous]

Graham, did you get my second e-mail?

 

[Anonymous]

If the rendering bridges the dpc and the pointing is bad, that could well be a significant cause of damp. What's on the outside of the damp walls? Is there any piled up soil bridging the dpc? Is there a concrete path not far below the dpc that could cause rainwater to bounce up above it? Are the gutters in good order? Etcetera....

 

[Anonymous]

Well, I'm getting yours. Send me your phone number by e-mail and we'll sort the techie-gremlims.

 

[Anonymous]

To be honest a report of damp on a survey doesnt mean much. You need to determine whether theres really a damp problem or not. One might assume the surveyor's word is The Truth, but this is routinely not the case.

> There is high reading of damp to most of the rear rooms.

means very little.

Cement rendering period house walls does tend to cause dampness. The effects of DPCs are open to some debate.

theres masses of threads about damp here, a days reading would be very well spent.

> Can any give me any advice I can pass on to her?
> Obviously a damp expert would solve the problem,

in most cases those calling themselves damp experts are the last people one shuold bring in.

Just look for the usual signs of a damp problem: are there any? In a lot of cases such as this, none exist. You cant move forward until you find out if you really do have a damp problem or not.

> The house next door seems to have had a damp problem, as it has the drilled and filled holes, which I'm sure has a proper name!!!!!!!

injected dpc, useless, and often fitted unnecessarily. Doesnt mean there is or was a damp problem, as so many are fitted on the basis of false, inaccurate or misleading reports.

> Anything else I should tell her to look at?

Yes, a site that exposes the scam that is the dampproofing industry, could save her much money.
http://www.dampbuster.com/

Also see
Re: Help Damp! Please read. *LINK*
Posted By: Johneds
Date: 12/8/2005 at 20:56:59
In Response To: Help Damp! Please read. (Cara)

and the numerous other threads here on damp problems.

> Repointing in places is dodgy, so that needs removing and repointing again.

In what way is it dodgy? If its cementitious and firm, removal can cause more damage than leaving it alone.

NT

 

[Anonymous]

If you want independent advice on damp call in a damp surveyor who you have to pay and has no vested interest in finding problems.

There are one or two around the country or try the BWPDA web site Freelance Surveyors.

PC

 

[Anonymous]

Dampbusters......... is this the same guy who reckons he's surveyed 30,000 properties and never found rising damp. Thats because he worked for a local authority surveying modern flats for condensation.

He also claimed to be THE countries leading expert in damp, although I see he's now changed his web site to ONE of the country's leading experts.

Rob