Owning your own home

British Gas are expensive but their staff probably receive less for the job, what you do get is a massive company with many different people who can back the work up if you have problems. Not worth it in my opinion. Try to nurse it through to the spring and you'll find loads of decent gas safe plumbers ready to fit it for a decent price. Try and even get a quote at the moment and you'll get loads of grumpy plumbers trying to skin you alive.

45 degree cracks running to corners of the room "can" indicate a serious problem. I would get that looked at very quickly.

It is following the roofline, and there are some very small hairline cracks following the bricks in a similar place on the outside.

We've got a builder coming at the end of the week, is that too late?

Can you not contact whoever fitted the steel support?

No, what you have is not a serious crack, a serious crack would be 3/4 - an inch wide. take a deep breath and google some serious cracks.

It seems you already know what the possible cause is, you've had some serious structural work done and the house is settling around it. There are issues called shear cracks which can be a sign of movement in the house but you already have a good idea what might have happened. i.e. steel beam put in.

I could be wrong about how serious it may become without treatment but at the moment just put the bed back and call an estate agent. :)

Why an estate agent? Time to sell?

For various reasons, I'm not really keen to get them back here.

Nice guys, but they were cheap and we got what we paid for.

Is it bare brickwork outside that you can inspect?

Possibly not what you want to hear but would getting a structural engineer in to look at that not another builder make more sense? Builder's have lots of practical experience in what is/isn't a problem and what is likely to happen in a given situation but they aren't qualified to make a judgement.

We used the structural engineer we used because he was cheapest of three quotes we got, I can send you his details if you like. His rate for additional site visits is still £250, but when we had one he forgot to charge us for it (or just thought the main fee was enough, not sure) so it might be worth asking how much he'd charge to come and have a look.

I've just got back from my ride and will go and have a look for those sanders shortly btw. Although I had a quick look yesterday and really don't know where I've put them...

p.s. Sorry to hear that, that's rubbish.

Update:

We had a terrifying moment last week when we dug out our current rental contract in order to give notice only to be reminded that it was an AST with a 12 month term, had no break clause and 8 months at £2.5k each still to go.

Cue a midnight email to the owner "Please Mr, won't you let us go early?"

He was actually very helpful and said that we could leave when we pleased with no penalty and - even better - if the sale got bogged down then we could stay on here if we needed sans contract.

"Phew" I think is the correct terminology.

Doubly good is that we appear to be set to exchange (and complete) on Friday (Friday, I know..) leaving us two or so weeks with both places in which to start doing the electrics/plastering/floors/stove etc.

Will post a key shot if it happens.

Get a structural engineer to come and have a look pretty sharpish.
Measure it daily.
Check your insurance docs.

Bromley South is zone 5. So anything north of the BS is still London.

Inner ring road defines "in" or "out" of London. Bromley etc is outer London.

It's not the ring road that defines it as the definition dates back to 1847.

Inner London v. Outer London:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inner_London
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outer_London

Anyone in or near SE23 have a recommendation for a cleaner for a weekly/bi-weekly visit? I work too much/am too lazy to do as the cleaning I should be doing to keep my house looking nice.

@Sparky

It's postcodes:

Technically, postcodes were originally defined by the Inner London area, not the other way around.

Yawnsville.

Not sure if that's in inner or outer London, but it's definitely in this thread today.

So I'm now inner London?

I'm at the northern end of E4

Wicked, I'll shout inner London at all the sheep I ride past on my commute.

meanwhile, in #wn4l

https://bdaily.co.uk/hospitality/14-10-2015/west-norwood-cinema-complex-gets-green-light/

Yep. Pm me

It is following the roofline, and there are some very small hairline cracks following the bricks in a similar place on the outside.

'Following the bricks' meaning running through the mortar rather than actual bricks snapped in half?

I'm inclined to agree with @Airhead and say don't panic. You've been fiddling with the structure of the house and it's probably just dropped a couple of mm. There's every chance the settling is now finished, the crack will never widen and a quick patch of plaster repair will see it sorted forever.

A structural engineer will give you the most reassurance.

It's common for builders not to dry pack the pads effectively for steel work so that the building above doesn't drop onto it. Often it's your neighbours basement project that will cause cracking like this.

does anyone have any advice for which dehumidifier for under £100 for a studio flat?