Party Wall Act and foundations any advice

stebiz

Parsnip7 wrote: »

It would if it didn't affect our insurance. Our insurance underwriters have told us to decline the underpinning. It would also need to be disclosed if we try to sell our house, and may put potential buyers off.

I think you are worrying too much. I'd rather buy a house and be an insurer come to that, of a house which had undergone foundation improvements than a house with 18" foundations.

teneighty

It would appear that the procedures under the Party Wall Act are not being followed here. You should have had a notice served by your neighbour and appointed your own party wall surveyor and a party wall award being prepared which will ensure the proposed works will not adversely affect your property. You need professional advice.


To offer a counter argument to some of the previous comments.


The fact that the foundations to your property are reasonably shallow does not mean they are inadequate of defective. It is fairly common for older properties. It is the neighbour's responsibility to undertake his work so that it does not undermine your foundations.


Personally I would try to avoid underpinning. If there is no evidence of existing movement the shallow foundation is obviously working. If you underpin the wall adjacent to the neighbour's new foundation you will be left with part of the property on a very solid immovable lump of concrete. The remainder of the house will be sitting on its perfectly adequate shallow foundation which probably moves up and down by minute amounts depending on the weather and time of year. Resulting in potentially damaging differential settlement cracks between the two parts. Unless you underpin the entire house, partial underpinning can cause far more problems, one of the reasons insurers and lenders hate underpinned properties.


The suggestion of casting the neighbour's foundation in alternate 1 metre long bays sounds like a very sensible solution although I would not want them to butt right up to to your foundation, rather keep as much distance as possible, at least 200mm if possible if wall is supposed to be set back 300mm as stated above. If it has to butt up I would want a slip plane between the two.


Good Luck

Parsnip7

Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to post replies.
I really wanted to see if anyone has been in a similar position to this before and how they dealt with it, even though we do have a surveyor looking after our interests.
The condition survey is going ahead next week, but the neighbour has already removed a considerable amount of earth away from between our two properties, so I hope the survey shows everything is still OK.
Our surveyors initial assessment is that the neighbour should build on a raft but the neighbour dismissed it straightaway.
Thanks again

zaax

As a rule, Victorian houses have shallow foundations of under 450mm, and they don't fall down

Parsnip7

By way of an update on the above post and also a couple of queries.
The Party Wall Agreement was signed after we were threatened with the costs of all 3 surveyors. The foundations went in and the bricklaying is almost finished.
Our original Party Wall Surveyor decided he didn't want to act for us any more as 'there was no revenue in it for him', so we have had to find another Party Wall Surveyor.
One area of concern is that the neighbour has placed his foundation on our land by approx 300mm inside the boundary for a length of 2m. Is he allowed to do this? We did not receive any detail for the area where this foundation is, only where the foundation would lie alongside our existing garage.we were unaware of this as the area was screened off until it was too late.
As I have said in previous posts the original plans were rejected for PP because of massing and overbearing, and the build has been achieved by calling it a 'Permitted Development - Class E outbuilding' - which cannot be attached to the main dwelling. It is separated from the main dwelling by 10cm. We suspect the neighbour will attempt to flash the roof of the outbuilding into his main property to stop dampness - can he do this? Surely this makes the building attached and would then require PP?

cyclonebri1

Parsnip7 wrote: »

Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to post replies.
I really wanted to see if anyone has been in a similar position to this before and how they dealt with it, even though we do have a surveyor looking after our interests.
The condition survey is going ahead next week, but the neighbour has already removed a considerable amount of earth away from between our two properties, so I hope the survey shows everything is still OK.
Our surveyors initial assessment is that the neighbour should build on a raft but the neighbour dismissed it straightaway.
Thanks again

Except me.

cyclonebri1

Parsnip7 wrote: »

By way of an update on the above post and also a couple of queries.
The Party Wall Agreement was signed after we were threatened with the costs of all 3 surveyors. The foundations went in and the bricklaying is almost finished.
Our original Party Wall Surveyor decided he didn't want to act for us any more as 'there was no revenue in it for him', so we have had to find another Party Wall Surveyor.
One area of concern is that the neighbour has placed his foundation on our land by approx 300mm inside the boundary for a length of 2m. Is he allowed to do this? We did not receive any detail for the area where this foundation is, only where the foundation would lie alongside our existing garage.we were unaware of this as the area was screened off until it was too late.
As I have said in previous posts the original plans were rejected for PP because of massing and overbearing, and the build has been achieved by calling it a 'Permitted Development - Class E outbuilding' - which cannot be attached to the main dwelling. It is separated from the main dwelling by 10cm. We suspect the neighbour will attempt to flash the roof of the outbuilding into his main property to stop dampness - can he do this? Surely this makes the building attached and would then require PP?

He absolutely is, "robust and substantial foundations", is a phrase I remember.

It's not a problem to you, why the issues??

And yes he can bridge this, it doesn't bear on your property.

cyclonebri1

Parsnip7 wrote: »

We have a Chartered Building Surveyor advising us. I understand the neighbour should be paying his costs.

And yours.

I_have_spoken

the neighbour has placed his foundation on our land by approx 300mm inside the boundary for a length of 2m. Is he allowed to do this?

As you signed the party-wall award, probably yes they can if that was set-out in the agreement.

The Party Wall Agreement was signed after we were threatened with the costs of all 3 surveyors

TBH, sounds like you've been stitched-up like a kipper or haven't followed advice. Your only hope now is apply to the Courts for a party-wall injunction to halt the work.

kaya

i was told by my local planning officer that digging out foundations in 1 or 2 meter strips when butting up to a neighbour is the best way to go about things only last week, i also read that the party wall act is not retrospective so if he is nearly finished my understanding is that you can't do much about it now but i'm happy to be corrected by somebody who has knowledge on this. In another posting there was a similar situation but no party wall act and whenever the building people went round the guy claimed he was doing some D.I.Y and there was nothing they could do about that either. i only hope that i have neighbours who are a little less arsey than you when i wish to build and don't force me to pay a fortune out on surveyors to copy what they have on their property which has stupidly shallow foundations and are happy to work with me rather than against me