Advice please! Cracks on exterior wall

mangomango2

Hi everyone,

Nervous first time buyer here. I like this 2 bed bed victorian terraced house in a popular location in Norwich. The interior is perfect for me but on the outside I've noticed some big cracks on the exterior walls. Not sure if it's the paint or something more sinister. The sensible thing to do would be to pay for a structural report from an engineer, but I don't want to fork out 700 quid to be told of an obvious problem. Any advice greatly appreciated!

*won't let me post link as I'm a new user. The biggest crack runs vertically down 5 bricks, there's corresponding sloping of the roof line as well... flooring is nice and flat inside though!

Doozergirl

A description is not going to help you get a sensible answer.

If you upload your photos to a hosting site and post a broken link to your photographs, someone will fix it and post the link back here for you.

eddddy

Also, did you ask the sellers what they thought the problem is?

They might have already had the cracking investigated.

Obviously, you can't necessarily trust what the sellers tell you, but it might be a helpful starting point.

Mr.Generous

from your description I can confirm it sounds like a crack. To be sure a picture would help. Is it rendered by any chance?

frosty5660

Get a report. I was in same boat,house report advised getting a structural report because of crack on back wall. The property was being sold at auction. Im so glad I did as the report said it would need underpinned with costs of approx. 12-15k. And trying to sell it on would have been a nightmare as people don't want to risk buying a property that's been underpinned it case of more structural problems in the future. I didn't buy the property but the cost of the report was money well spent and a lesson leared....

alumende27

With the caveat that none of us have seen pictures of these cracks - If you're planning to use a mortgage to buy the property be aware that the lender's valuer will almost certainly demand a report from a structural engineer if they see some big cracks on a wall.

Hoploz

A picture is best if you can get on sorted. I understand that the most sinister cracks are ines running diagonally.

Can you see the top and bottom of the vertical crack? In other words are the bricks above and below the crack in order?

Does the crack go through the actual bricks, or is it the joining mortar that's cracked?

Is the corresponding interior wall visible? Has it been freshly decorated? Or is there wallpaper potentially covering it?