Supporting floor beams

Parafira

Hi guys,

I am buying a house and there is a wall on the first floor (right above the stairwell) with a few cracks.

I just had a structural engineer onsite and he said that this is not a structural problem, it is just the wall on the first floor was build from some wrong (too heavy concrete bricks) and the floor beam sank a bit, he said that the floor beam needs to be supported and the wall needs to be rebuilt using some proper bricks.

This "floor beam needs to be supported" is a bit worrying. I could not speak to the engineer about the details and will be waiting for his report for a few days.

Does anybody know if supporting those beams is a big deal and if this may affect the insurance premium?

Thanks!

mchale

Parafira wrote: »

Hi guys,

I am buying a house and there is a wall on the first floor (right above the stairwell) with a few cracks.

I just had a structural engineer onsite and he said that this is not a structural problem, it is just the wall on the first floor was build from some wrong (too heavy concrete bricks) and the floor beam sank a bit, he said that the floor beam needs to be supported and the wall needs to be rebuilt using some proper bricks.

This "floor beam needs to be supported" is a bit worrying. I could not speak to the engineer about the details and will be waiting for his report for a few days.

Does anybody know if supporting those beams is a big deal and if this may affect the insurance premium?

Thanks!

Remove offending wall, jack floor up with acrow prop, secure in new postion and then replace offending wall with stud wall, job done.

Parafira

mchale wrote: »

Remove offending wall, jack floor up with acrow prop, secure in new postion and then replace offending wall with stud wall, job done.

Thanks,

It sounds easy :-) But money wise is it an expensive procedure? I know an approx price of the wall rebuilding, is it too expensive to fix a couple of joists/beams?

AlexMac

Not a big deal- without knowing more detail, and as a non-expert I'd guess at £some hundreds rather than tens of thousands. But surely as you say 'I am buying a house and there is a wall on the first floor (right above the stairwell) with a few cracks' you will want to get a quick builder's estimate and haggle the price down, as the fact that even slightly structurally unsound work has been done in the past is still the owner's problem til you complete? Whether or not he or a predecessor did it. You've obviously prudent enough to comission an engineer's report so why noy go the whole hog. The vendor doesn't have to reduce thye price, of course, but if you and your solicitor hang tough, I bet they will.
Unless you mean you have already completed on the sale , in which case you'll want it sorted properly.
Insurance-wise, I can't see a big problem; I don't ever recall being asked about the condition of my properies when insuring them, other than the usual 'ever been any subsidence' Q. So unless you have to lie or falsify in response to any specific Q on the proposal form, how will the insurer know. Unless of course you suffer subsequent subsidence or collapse (which seems unlikely from your description of the surveying engineer's report) and they discover that there was a problem which you wilfully neglected.

So all round, it seems fixable

Parafira

Thanks Alex,

I have not completed yet, the bank is not releasing the money because of these cracks, that is why a Structural Survey was requested by the bank. I will definitely be asking the vendor to fix, or to drop the price, as when I was making an offer I was told that the cracks are cosmetic and a simple re-plastering will sort everything.

Thanks,

Yorkie1

I would get him to drop the price if you can stomach getting the work done yourself and the lender isn't retaining too much money from the mortgage (which may not happen at all). That way, you have control over who does it and to what standard.

Parafira

Thanks all!