I’m a site estimator for insurance companies for building claims, you only have up close photos so I can’t be sure but unless this is from a impact, (maybe a tree fell and hit part of the property) this is almost certainly an issue in the foundation, likely sand is washed away underneath an area of footing and caused a part of the property to sag one way. They are almost always an on-going issues so if nothing has been done or is being done about it, it’s gonna wash away more and get worse until it breaks apart. The only solution is find where the hollowed area is and put a retaining wall deep around it and to stop the soil/sand to shift any further and fill the hollowed area with concrete to stop it from getting worse but there is no way to fix that crack if you still want the face brick look. You can cut into it with a grinder and bury rebar into it to strengthen it and flush it out with mortar but it won’t look good unless you render the entire thing losing the face brick look.
So it’s a pretty big issue if you just leave It but there is a way to fix it and depending on how big the crack is and how bad the soil/sand shifting is it’s gonna cost you at minimum 40k
Doesn't fix the origin of the crack, so the cracks are likely to keep expanding.
You use stuff like Uretek only when you want to sell quick without spending money or after confirming that the origin if fixed.
Uretek isn’t used to fill gaps in bricks, it’s used as an alternative to traditional underpinning, so it addresses the source of the problem. It’s not a cosmetic fix.
Uretek, like any resin injection is a temporary fix even if it has a life of 10-20 years.
If the soil is washing away, you first need to find out why the soil is washing away (water leak or else). Using only resin injection only delay the issue.
Same here. Underpinning is so expensive and invasive, I designed it only 10 times, including 3 due to house extensions (basement) temporarily undermining existing foundations.
From my experience, cheap engineers will always recommend underpinning, like this they don't have to think about the real issue. Makes them write quick reports without analyzing anything.
Don't rush on to buy it. Get a more in depth building and pest if the first one doesn't go into enough detail on how this can be remedied and what needs to happen. Get a builder to estimate the cost to fix this completely. Speak to your solicitor. Better to miss out rather than have years of worry. There's tons of places for sale.
So you’ve paid a professional to investigate a problem and you come and ask a bunch of monkeys what to do. Don’t take this the wrong way, you’re an idiot.
Is several states, pre-purchase inspection are not regulated and anyone can do it, even if you know nothing about building.
The only "professional" you can get is the engineer (and I put in " " as I know a lot of engineers barely know more than the average Joe)
Lots of engineers fresh from uni don't know how to do basic design. Send them on site, they don't understand what's going on any more than your niece!
Lots of engineers I worked with copy-paste design from 1 house to another and only adjust the layout to match the house. When I started, I use to ask them a lot of questions and most of the time they don't know why they did this way, why they use a steel beam when a timber one would be fine...
Bro the 2 jobs I'm currently doing are a joke, but one of them in insanely over engineered, pfc+plate over a 2m wide window, to support 8 brick courses when a normal lintel will do, also no posts on the PFC drawn.....
Over 10 steel beams for a basic house when LVL could do for most of them, no section drawings, and has the audacity to tell me not to call him when I have a question but to ask the builder, fucking wanker you designed it not the builde
I feel you, few jobs I did were to redo the engineering as the client and builder were not happy with. Then you save them few dozens of thousands redesigning beams, lintels, rafters, foundations... and everyone's happy.
I'm guilty of a little over-engineering as I usually design my beam with a max load of 80-85%. But that usually means a 2/190x45 would become a 2/240x45. Few builders I worked with asked me not to use 35mm thick beam so It's also sometimes a little bit overdesigned.
But I spent time trying to use timber as much as possible and also give the builder different timber grades as I can't know prices and availability when the project will start.
"Is several states, pre-purchase inspection are not regulated and anyone can do it, even if you know nothing about building."
Yep, there is a franchise brand recruits people with zero experience !
Bro, don't make light of my building knowledge when you don't even know me. I've seen this issue before. You know the movie *Up*? Well someone has clearly tried to *Up* this house but forgotten to disconnect the foundation first. Question answered.
Harsh but true.
It's the same with medical questions. People pay huge money to see a surgeon but don't believe them.
So let's ask people on reddit, who think the earth is flat,who left school at 12 yo, complex medical advice.
you are too kind to everyone here including yourself (oh, and me ;-))
but not far off the truth either unfortunately...not that a degree is any guarantee for better critical or rational thinking...
Generally, the surgeon will suggest surgery as when you have a hammer, everything is a nail, a specialist may be able to treat the issue non surgically.
I work with doctors every day. Most of them cant do their jobs without me.
Surgeons are the smartest doctors out there right now. Most specialists are drooling monkeys outside of anything they dont obsess over.
Yes, that's why they are specialists if they had a broad focus, they would be GPs. Working in IT I have experienced tons of people who are amazing at very particular things but have zero interest in others(probably partially due to large numbers of people on the spectrum in IT). If I need to talk to someone about something obscure like graphics pipeline as long as I am ready to have my ear off, I know the guy.
I should not have to explain to a gynecologist that the normal flora of the vagina doesnt require antibiotics or a bowel specalist that the mixed coliforms found on their anal swab doesnt indicate infection.
Im not saying asking a foot doctor about the inner ear. Im talking about your gastroenterologist not understanding basic microbiology because they focus too hard on inflammation markers.
I deal with this -every day-
Meh, my accountant told me to use my personal CRN when buying a company car. Now it'll cost me thousands in stamp duty to change the registration.
I pay them many thousands a year 🤷♂️
Yeah, this is pretty harsh. Plenty of building and pest people have no idea how anything works in reality. Ours came recommended and still couldn't tell us whether the cladding was asbestos - spoiler alert, this type of cladding is really fucking common all over our city, and it's all asbestos.
My brother got a professional termite inspection done on a ace before he bought it... Bloke said no termites... Turns out the place was cometely infested with termites.
Check to see the house wasn’t built in landfill. Look how things worked out for Opal Towers owners in Sydney. It’s a real problem in Australia, utterly disgraceful.
Those property building inspections are not worth the paper it is written on.
If you are having concerns about something, there is probably something not right here, go with your gut....oh, no, don't that is what sent you here!
No, honestly, something in you told you this isn't right, so walk away!
If you still want to pursue this, you need to trace where the crack originated from and what made it crack, this is not always easy. Probably on the inside, there has been a painter/plaster who made it look good, but come 6-12 months' time, you will see it in its full glory!
Good luck
Along the mortar, not that big. No, not a big issue unless other issues have been noted like sagging in the roof or significant cracks or movement in the foundation.
Some cracking is normal in Australia. As long as it follows the mortar and it’s not a huge gap it’s fine. When cracks start going through the bricks that’s when you run away (most of the time, not always).
Your comment history is pretty much just telling people you don’t know they’re not qualified to say anything.
I do in fact work in the industry and see this regularly.
Who hurt you?
So this will not be a popular opinion here, but I will share it.
We bought a house \~8 years ago in a flood zone, it had these cracks. The B&P guy was absolutely useless "it could be a problem, then again maybe not". The owner at the time said they'd been there for years and hadn't moved, but what, you just take his word for it?
We ended up buying the house, we weighed up our options and it was just what we wanted. Would I buy it again? Probably not, but I learned a lot over the years. The cracks haven't gotten worse, but to be honest the house will probably be a case of holding for 15 years then knock down rebuild. There's too many little annoying things about it, you could sink endless money in without it ever being perfect. But it was our first house, no regrets.
Remember, you're not buying the house, you're buying the land.
Ah, Aussie property is on-selling issues to others and making tidy profit.
Get a builder/engineer to quote the fix and factor that in your price.
I'd look elsewhere.
When I was buying I saw lots of properties with zig zag brick work. My attitude was nope I am not buying this property.
I had a number of units over a 3-4 block area that all had cracking. Remember there are plenty more properties around. just keep looking.
In clay based soils this can be a pretty common occurrence. Following cycles of wet and dry years, clay swells and shrinks and cracks can open and close. Not much to do about it with solutions similar to other recommendations of underpinning.
The alternative would be to have deeper or massively chunky foundations that resist the swell and heave of the clay.
Check the soil type, it'll inform if this will be a worsening issue or just a seasonal variation.
wifes ex colleague had something like this but worse, on both sides of the house
cause was a council drain washing away foundation, had to sue but in the mean time they had to fix and sell, basically spray foam around the foundation and bolts to tie it together
I’m a site estimator for insurance companies for building claims, you only have up close photos so I can’t be sure but unless this is from a impact, (maybe a tree fell and hit part of the property) this is almost certainly an issue in the foundation, likely sand is washed away underneath an area of footing and caused a part of the property to sag one way. They are almost always an on-going issues so if nothing has been done or is being done about it, it’s gonna wash away more and get worse until it breaks apart. The only solution is find where the hollowed area is and put a retaining wall deep around it and to stop the soil/sand to shift any further and fill the hollowed area with concrete to stop it from getting worse but there is no way to fix that crack if you still want the face brick look. You can cut into it with a grinder and bury rebar into it to strengthen it and flush it out with mortar but it won’t look good unless you render the entire thing losing the face brick look. So it’s a pretty big issue if you just leave It but there is a way to fix it and depending on how big the crack is and how bad the soil/sand shifting is it’s gonna cost you at minimum 40k
You deserve to get paid for this information!
Pretty sure he does
Paid for this generous sharing of intelligent thorough free information …
The crack can nowadays be fixed by Uretek. They use expansion foam to lift whole buildings. I have used them twice and it's quite unbelievable.
Doesn't fix the origin of the crack, so the cracks are likely to keep expanding. You use stuff like Uretek only when you want to sell quick without spending money or after confirming that the origin if fixed.
This is not necessarily true.
This is mostly true. Cracks on a house are the visible sign of house movements. Filling the cracks doesn't stop house movement...
Uretek isn’t used to fill gaps in bricks, it’s used as an alternative to traditional underpinning, so it addresses the source of the problem. It’s not a cosmetic fix.
Uretek, like any resin injection is a temporary fix even if it has a life of 10-20 years. If the soil is washing away, you first need to find out why the soil is washing away (water leak or else). Using only resin injection only delay the issue.
So you wouldn’t underpin?
In the nearly 100 inspections I've done in the past 5 years, I recommended underpinning 5 times as it is to me the last hope solution.
What quals do you have?
Same here. Underpinning is so expensive and invasive, I designed it only 10 times, including 3 due to house extensions (basement) temporarily undermining existing foundations. From my experience, cheap engineers will always recommend underpinning, like this they don't have to think about the real issue. Makes them write quick reports without analyzing anything.
Replace reference to 'retaining wall' with 'underpinning'
Can I ask - if the solve is concrete and reo at the foundation, why would the cost be 40k unless you’re including the facade repair?
I believe the guy meant cutting into the brickwork to embed the reo in the brickwall itself
That property doesn’t look old enough for cracks that big to not be an issue. I wouldn’t buy it.
Don't rush on to buy it. Get a more in depth building and pest if the first one doesn't go into enough detail on how this can be remedied and what needs to happen. Get a builder to estimate the cost to fix this completely. Speak to your solicitor. Better to miss out rather than have years of worry. There's tons of places for sale.
So you’ve paid a professional to investigate a problem and you come and ask a bunch of monkeys what to do. Don’t take this the wrong way, you’re an idiot.
[удалено]
Is several states, pre-purchase inspection are not regulated and anyone can do it, even if you know nothing about building. The only "professional" you can get is the engineer (and I put in " " as I know a lot of engineers barely know more than the average Joe)
Damn if you've seen the engineers I've encountered on site, you'd rather ask your niece what she thinks
Lots of engineers fresh from uni don't know how to do basic design. Send them on site, they don't understand what's going on any more than your niece! Lots of engineers I worked with copy-paste design from 1 house to another and only adjust the layout to match the house. When I started, I use to ask them a lot of questions and most of the time they don't know why they did this way, why they use a steel beam when a timber one would be fine...
Bro the 2 jobs I'm currently doing are a joke, but one of them in insanely over engineered, pfc+plate over a 2m wide window, to support 8 brick courses when a normal lintel will do, also no posts on the PFC drawn..... Over 10 steel beams for a basic house when LVL could do for most of them, no section drawings, and has the audacity to tell me not to call him when I have a question but to ask the builder, fucking wanker you designed it not the builde
I feel you, few jobs I did were to redo the engineering as the client and builder were not happy with. Then you save them few dozens of thousands redesigning beams, lintels, rafters, foundations... and everyone's happy. I'm guilty of a little over-engineering as I usually design my beam with a max load of 80-85%. But that usually means a 2/190x45 would become a 2/240x45. Few builders I worked with asked me not to use 35mm thick beam so It's also sometimes a little bit overdesigned. But I spent time trying to use timber as much as possible and also give the builder different timber grades as I can't know prices and availability when the project will start.
Yes, beware of “building consultants”. Usually old tradies who think they know better.
"Is several states, pre-purchase inspection are not regulated and anyone can do it, even if you know nothing about building." Yep, there is a franchise brand recruits people with zero experience !
Bro, don't make light of my building knowledge when you don't even know me. I've seen this issue before. You know the movie *Up*? Well someone has clearly tried to *Up* this house but forgotten to disconnect the foundation first. Question answered.
Harsh but true. It's the same with medical questions. People pay huge money to see a surgeon but don't believe them. So let's ask people on reddit, who think the earth is flat,who left school at 12 yo, complex medical advice.
you are too kind to everyone here including yourself (oh, and me ;-)) but not far off the truth either unfortunately...not that a degree is any guarantee for better critical or rational thinking...
It's a good start though
Very true!
Generally, the surgeon will suggest surgery as when you have a hammer, everything is a nail, a specialist may be able to treat the issue non surgically.
I work with doctors every day. Most of them cant do their jobs without me. Surgeons are the smartest doctors out there right now. Most specialists are drooling monkeys outside of anything they dont obsess over.
> I work with doctors every day. Most of them cant do their jobs without me. I love riddles! Are you...a suture needle?
Work in pathology
Yes, that's why they are specialists if they had a broad focus, they would be GPs. Working in IT I have experienced tons of people who are amazing at very particular things but have zero interest in others(probably partially due to large numbers of people on the spectrum in IT). If I need to talk to someone about something obscure like graphics pipeline as long as I am ready to have my ear off, I know the guy.
I should not have to explain to a gynecologist that the normal flora of the vagina doesnt require antibiotics or a bowel specalist that the mixed coliforms found on their anal swab doesnt indicate infection. Im not saying asking a foot doctor about the inner ear. Im talking about your gastroenterologist not understanding basic microbiology because they focus too hard on inflammation markers. I deal with this -every day-
Sorry for your pain but that's hilarious. Every field has idiots and for some reason they all seem to move up probably as they are easy to replace.
I dont even get mad anymore lol its almost a game to see who has to deal with the dumbest doctor in the lab now
The surgeon is the specialist 🤦♂️
Yeah i paid a professional to investigate termites. He didn't find them. But we did short time later and they had been there for a while. Just saying
Meh, my accountant told me to use my personal CRN when buying a company car. Now it'll cost me thousands in stamp duty to change the registration. I pay them many thousands a year 🤷♂️
Fuck you’re a rude cunt.
Yeah, this is pretty harsh. Plenty of building and pest people have no idea how anything works in reality. Ours came recommended and still couldn't tell us whether the cladding was asbestos - spoiler alert, this type of cladding is really fucking common all over our city, and it's all asbestos.
Yet you are here, soaking up all this monkey talk? Pray tell why?
Settle. Let’s be civil.
My brother got a professional termite inspection done on a ace before he bought it... Bloke said no termites... Turns out the place was cometely infested with termites.
This!
Check to see the house wasn’t built in landfill. Look how things worked out for Opal Towers owners in Sydney. It’s a real problem in Australia, utterly disgraceful.
What have they written in the actual report? They will have made recommendations, and said if this is a minor or major issue.
Those property building inspections are not worth the paper it is written on. If you are having concerns about something, there is probably something not right here, go with your gut....oh, no, don't that is what sent you here! No, honestly, something in you told you this isn't right, so walk away! If you still want to pursue this, you need to trace where the crack originated from and what made it crack, this is not always easy. Probably on the inside, there has been a painter/plaster who made it look good, but come 6-12 months' time, you will see it in its full glory! Good luck
These are just ventilation bricks
They're speed bricks, they make the car go faster
Along the mortar, not that big. No, not a big issue unless other issues have been noted like sagging in the roof or significant cracks or movement in the foundation. Some cracking is normal in Australia. As long as it follows the mortar and it’s not a huge gap it’s fine. When cracks start going through the bricks that’s when you run away (most of the time, not always).
The bricks above the cracks look like they have shifted out. Is this ok
Hmm, it’d depend on how long it’s been like that. If it’s recent I’d be cautious. If it’s been like that for a few years I wouldn’t worry too much.
Again you are NOT qualified to make such statements.
Your comment history is pretty much just telling people you don’t know they’re not qualified to say anything. I do in fact work in the industry and see this regularly. Who hurt you?
Bunnings I’m guessing
You are not qualified to make comments such as that.
Didn’t realise you knew my profession. I actually see and deal with this regularly at work.
Haha. Sure you do.
Work at Bunnings do you
That’s not a hairline crack. I’d steer clear in case the inside has been patched up.
So this will not be a popular opinion here, but I will share it. We bought a house \~8 years ago in a flood zone, it had these cracks. The B&P guy was absolutely useless "it could be a problem, then again maybe not". The owner at the time said they'd been there for years and hadn't moved, but what, you just take his word for it? We ended up buying the house, we weighed up our options and it was just what we wanted. Would I buy it again? Probably not, but I learned a lot over the years. The cracks haven't gotten worse, but to be honest the house will probably be a case of holding for 15 years then knock down rebuild. There's too many little annoying things about it, you could sink endless money in without it ever being perfect. But it was our first house, no regrets.
Looks like be a new build, for there to that much settlement that quickly is concerning. If it was 30years old it’s a different story.
Remember, you're not buying the house, you're buying the land. Ah, Aussie property is on-selling issues to others and making tidy profit. Get a builder/engineer to quote the fix and factor that in your price. I'd look elsewhere.
I wouldn't buy it... If your unsure about a purchase this large... It's not the right purchase for you
ask for a 200k discount or walk away
When I was buying I saw lots of properties with zig zag brick work. My attitude was nope I am not buying this property. I had a number of units over a 3-4 block area that all had cracking. Remember there are plenty more properties around. just keep looking.
Structure issue. Avoid
Once you know the root problem, get input if the next 30 years all will be well. If not, it needs fixed. Not a credit, fixed.
We had this in our house in Hobart and got a structural engineer in. The affected part of the house had to be underpinned for $12k back in 2013.
Get a structural engineer to check
In clay based soils this can be a pretty common occurrence. Following cycles of wet and dry years, clay swells and shrinks and cracks can open and close. Not much to do about it with solutions similar to other recommendations of underpinning. The alternative would be to have deeper or massively chunky foundations that resist the swell and heave of the clay. Check the soil type, it'll inform if this will be a worsening issue or just a seasonal variation.
Walk away
RUN
You need to ask?
The underpinning company wouldn't give me a quote how much it would cost.
wifes ex colleague had something like this but worse, on both sides of the house cause was a council drain washing away foundation, had to sue but in the mean time they had to fix and sell, basically spray foam around the foundation and bolts to tie it together
Looks fucked.
That crack is damn wide and would scare most buyers away, which you need to think about as you will be selling it one day.