Rising Damp Problem, Help Needed Please

Cullumpster

Hello guys,
I was wondering if anyone would be able to help me on a little problem of mine, i hope i am putting this in the right category.

Ok here goes.........

I brought my house 4 years ago and have finally managed to get enough money to decorate the whole of the downstairs including my kitchen.

I have installed the new kitchen (at the begining of the year) and had the walls re plastered, but a freind of mine noticed the other day a band of damp about hip height all accross the middle of my wall.
When theweather is really damp (as it has been recently) the band gets darker

She advised me that it was rising damp (is this right?) and to get my survey details off of my solicitor, which i did (at a price!).

I checked and it seems that the house was treated for rising damp once in 1981 and then again in 1983, although both times the company that quoted came out and fixed the problem.

However it's back by the looks of it and i have tried to contact the damp proofing people that did the job in the first place, as i was told that if i had a guarentee then would have to correct it for me FOC, but as you may have guessed they no longer exist!!

2 main questions,
1) what the heck do i do now, does it make the guarentees void? will i be able to sell my house?

2) can i get the work done and claim through my house insurance

Sorry 3!! what happenes if i can't claim, i actually can not afford to pay for this as i have used my money to pay off loans, c/cards and pay my kitchen in full.

Please help any info would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks
Vic

Boohbah

How old is the house, has it got solid walls or cavity.
In what room is this patch appearing in. Is it near a window or door. What type of finish is on the outside walls, ie; brickwork, rendering. There should be a minimum of 6" between the dpc and ground level, is this so. Are there any soil pipes or rain water pipes adjacent to the damp patch.

Cullumpster

How old is the house, has it got solid walls or cavity.
In what room is this patch appearing in. Is it near a window or door. What type of finish is on the outside walls, ie; brickwork, rendering. There should be a minimum of 6" between the dpc and ground level, is this so. Are there any soil pipes or rain water pipes adjacent to the damp patch.

Hi there,
It's in my kitchen opposite the window, it's a terraced house so probably over 100 years old and it would have solid walls i think.
It was an end terrace but there are now flats next door but there is not a gap between my house and theirs (if you know what i mean?)
As far as i know there are no soil or rain pipes near the house either, sorry i'm not very helpful!

Boohbah

So, am I right in saying this damp is appearing on an inside wall (as apposed to an outside wall) as you say its opposite a window.

Ivor_Headache

Hi Cullumster,

Sorry but it is unlikely your insurers will cough up for rising damp. You say you bought the house 4 years ago. Did you have a mortage to purchase the property? You mention that you have had 'survey' details of the property. I assume this survey was carried out at the time of purchase, for you to obtain the mortgage. It reallly depends on what type of survey you had as to whether or not you may posssibly have a claim against the surveyor/building society. If you only had the 'basic' survey for valution purposes, it is very unlikely that you would be able to pursue either the surveyor or the building society. However I'm pretty sure that if you had a full structural survey carried out, and there was evidence of rising damp,(which clearly at some time there has been) if there were no recommendations contained in the survey regarding that, you may well be able to pursue the matter. Can't quite understand why your solicitor should charge you for a copy of the report, you should be entitled to it, as you will have paid for it before the mortgage company would give you an offer of a mortage!

Finally, it is not actually that difficult these days to put in a DPC yourself. You can hire all of the equipment you need from most hire shops. You would have to take off the skirting boards, allow the plaster to dry out, remove it up to a height where it is 'sound', inject the walls with the DPC, usually about 6" above ground level, then replace the shirting boards, making sure that when you do, you do not create a 'bridge' between below where you have injected the walls, and above. With a bit of luck, you could find the plaster is sound, if it is, all you would need to do, so as not to create a 'bridge' is remove the plaster to just above the course of bricks in which you have injected the DPC, and then fit taller, or deeper, whichever you prefer, skirting board. Sounds expensive I know, but actually it is not to bad. The biggest problem would be if the plaster itself had degraded and needed replastering up to the 'hip' height you mention.

There could however be a much simpler explanation, with even more luck, it could be that the pointing outside where you have the damp, might need replacing. A messy fiddly, time consuming job, but very cheap to do.

Hope this helps.

pinkkipper

I know this sound stupid put are you able to check where the plaster ends.

We had rising damp that was traced back to the plaster being too low and covering the DPC - the water just soaked up the plaster.

By any account if a DPC was done then there should be a cement render with waterproofing in it rather then just plaster

Cullumpster

So, am I right in saying this damp is appearing on an inside wall (as apposed to an outside wall) as you say its opposite a window.

Hi,
well it is an inside wall now as i have had flats built next door to my house, but before it would have been an outside wall.

Ivor_Headache, thanks for that i may have to invest in a DIY DPC kit.
The plaster hasn't degraded though it has just been re skimmed about 6 months ago so it is quite sound, would it be best to just hack off the whole lot up to hip height and re-do the DPC, or is that just a stupid idea?? (sorry i may have been having a blonde moment there, think i know stuff about DIY but it's all lies!!)

Boohbah

So, presumable there is some sort of a gap between your wall and the new wall of the flats.

Have you checked to see if the gap is clear.

Very often mortar droppings etc end up on the ground, between the two buildings, and rise above the dpc. (damp proof course) thus forming a bridge.

There needs to be 6" clear space between the ground level and your dpc.

Hope thats clear to you.

Cullumpster

So, presumable there is some sort of a gap between your wall and the new wall of the flats.

Hi there,
no there is no gap at all, it looks like the flats are actually joined to the house!

Boohbah

That could well be were your problem lies Cullumpster.

I would suggest you engage a surveyor to check things out further for you.
He will obviously be able to advise you further.

If indeed that is were the problem lies, he will be able to prepare a report for you, to present to the builders of the flat's in order for them to rectify matters.

Good luck, let us know how you get on.

Ivor_Headache

Hi Cullumpster,

Certainly the building of flats next door might be the problem, but you did say there was a history of damp.

As boobah says, when building on to an existing property, when the new ajoining wall is built, ( and it certainly should not to touching yours, there should be at least , a gap of, well it used to be 2" in old money, it may be more now), when the bricklayers lay the courses, it is so important they remove, as they go along, any mortar that is dropped. This as you can imagine in a space 2" wide, is almost impossible the higher you get, but it is going to be very difficult now to access the space between your two properties to see if that is the cause. If this is the problem but you can't prove it, then unless the 'debris' is removed, you would be wasting your time putting a new DPC in as the problem would just recur. If you have no luck with proving the builders of the flats next door did cause the damp to occur, and you decide to inject the DPC yourself, then as I said earlier it is relatively simple to do yourself. If it is a solid wall and not a cavity wall, then you could just about be Ok. If it is a cavity wall, unless you inject both skins, you might be wasting your time and money. But to answer your question, if the plaster is absolutely sound, then it is not neccessary at all to take it up to 'hip' height, (even using the bestof plasterers, you usually manage to see the'join'). You do really only need to take it up the the level of just below where the top of the skirting board would be, but you must make sure that as I said before you do not form a' bridge' between the newly injected DPC, and the course above. Sorry not to be more positive for you.