Owning your own home

Oh my gods the price.

Partner and I was looking at an identical house in Sheffield (without that kitchen extension) which was 250k, and think it’s just about an ok price.

800 grand for a 2 up 2 down with a loft conversion???? Fucking hell.

That’s reasonable value for round here if a little toppy and I don’t see this as an expensive area?!
It’s over the back from my place but too close to railway line and the school for my liking.

Anyone who owns or has owned a victorian or older property give me some advice on damp detected during a survey? Parts of the house are apparently as old as 1820. The survey found 3 points of damp on the ground floor on the oldest walls, which are solid brick. In 2 of the 3 areas the pain on the wall has started to flake off.

The survey says "Walls are mainly well plastered and dry but there is some evidence of isolated and minor rising damp on the ground floor. Some wall dampness is common in such houses and was not thought to be exceptional. Action: for areas of high wall moisture maintain good ventilation and monitor going forward". I spoke to them on the phone and they said if it was their house they wouldn't do anything about it.

Having only previously owned a brand new build, I'm a little concerned. Damp of any sort sounds terrible to me. I guess I'm looking for some reassurance, or advice on what options are to actually address the issue, rather than just live with it.

I wouldn't worry too much about it. There is a theory that rising damp is a myth, I'd be looking for dodgy gutters, high ground level etc around the problem areas.

We recently left an 1830s property. The bedroom was fairly damp/measured high humidity on our little thermometer thingy, however it had three external walls, and it improved when next door got rid of a shed that was too close to our wall. When we had it replastered it was all fine, except where I eventually found some rubble in the roof cavity.

Tldr: all the damp was from specific solvable things, which luckily we had enough control over to deal with

Any old home you can expect a bit of damp, generally it’s fine and manageable.

Even it it were rising damp (as in moisture wicking up from ground level) it would be impossible to determine without invasive investigation - stripping plaster, lifting floors and the like.

As @jellybaby says, there's usually obvious proximate causes, and they tend to be straightforward fixes.

A lot depends on how the house is built and for older solid wall houses, what changes have been made since it was built (extensions, exterior paths, rendering, new windows, new plaster inside, new floors etc...). A decent survey should mention this sort of thing.

Also concrete render can lead to damp

Many thanks for your comments, @Grumpy_Git, @TW, @Jameo, @jellybaby and @jackbepablo - very helpful and reassuring. I've done some more watching and reading on the subject this morning as well, and that has helped.

There are quite a few waste pipes on the wall where there is damp at ground level, so I will give those an extra level of scrutiny now to make sure none of them are leaking and causing the damp. 2 of the 3 spots are either side of the front door, so I wonder whether it's something to do with that?

It sounds like a lot of people in the past have inadvertently made these problems worse by trying to solve them rather than just letting the walls breather. One article I read said that people trying to over-insulate older properties to reduce their heating bills has caused problems in many cases.

This is interesting to me, because another concern was the EPC certificate. It's currently F and apparently could be C. Main areas for improvement are to add insulation to cavity walls and the roof. The place had a loft conversion in 2017 and apparently there's minimal insulation in the roof, which is a decision on the part of the current owner that I can't understand. Anyway, it'll likely be quite a few years before we even start to look at insulation or whether there's anything we can do with the damp, as we'll be relatively cash poor for the first couple of years due to combination of childcare costs and interest rates.

Most of the damp we found in our 1901 flat were easily sorted by repointing the brick and fixing the gutter.

Avoid rendering (except for lime), those building really need to breathe, like a breathable rain coat.

I got similar on my Edwardian property.

It's annoying because it is a real fucker to troubleshoot and it is difficult to get anyone to deal with it who isn't a cowboy. In my experience you can't just get someone in who will fix it for you.

Some stuff has obvious solutions but you can end up fixing a likely cause waiting a few months, discovering that the problem isn't solved, trying to fix another thing, waiting again, etc.

It wouldn't have stopped me buying the place but it is more annoying than I expected.

Where are the cavity walls? It's much harder to retrofit insulation to cavity walls without risking moisture problems. Solid walls externally insulated are easier to get right. Damp isn't binary. Solid walls touching the ground are going to be more damp than a newbuild with full membranes, but it isn't necessarily a problem. You might have to get used to some things like not having furniture right up against external walls, give space for the walls to breathe. You don't want a mouldy sofa or bookshelf.

Speaking of damp, I've been trying to work out where some damp on a wall adjacent to a capped chimney breast is coming from and wonder whether the chimney may be part of the issue.

How capped are they meant to be? This is what it looks like (the mucky roof side) and I can see that there are some gaps in the cap, is this how it is meant to be?

1 Attachment

Lil' update here. Followed your (and others') advice and sought two independent opinions from registered installers in the area. Both were pretty shocked at the flue distance from our gable end, and said it was totally unnecessary – and likely the result of poor planning / bringing the wrong length pipes to the job. They also said it will be less stable.

Cue some lengthy back-and-forth with our installer and a not-so-casual reference to the Consumer Rights Act, and we're in business. They've agreed to come back and refit the pipe higher, and to within a tolerance of 50-100mm of our wall, all at their cost.

Neighbours are psyched. I'm psyched. Gleefully chalking one up for not going away / being a pain in the arse.

i think they should be fully closed up top, then an air brick or two are added into the stack to allow for ventilation

are to add insulation to cavity walls and the roof

In an 1830s property? It won’t have cavity walls.

You probably can insulate the floor space in the attic though, just don’t fuck it up.

We have seen the same symptoms as you, had a roofer round this week who explained that the most likely cause was ingress through the gaps in those angled tiles- recommended closing up the top properly as @hvsds mentioned

I'm perhaps getting myself confused.

I was very surprised to learn that parts of the house are as old as 1820, as it doesn't look this old externally or internally, and it has been clearly extended fairly recently (single storey with flat roof and skylight to the rear, then loft conversion). The interior and windows are also pretty modern. The surveyor said that they suspect it might have actually originally been 2 separate houses that were joined at some point. Looking at the floor plans, I think they might be right. There's a very thick wall down the middle of the ground and 1st floor, suggesting this might originally have been 2 terraced houses.

The EPC certificate makes reference to both solid walls and cavity walls. However, the survey says "the outside walls are of solid brick construction without cavity".

It was my presumption that whichever walls are original would be solid brick, but the newer walls (definitely at least the rear extension) would be cavity walls. Am I wrong in my presumption?

can anyone recommend a double glazing company?
Is it best to go for one of the big names that advertise on TV or should I look for a smaller local company?

It was my presumption that whichever walls are original would be solid brick, but the newer walls (definitely at least the rear extension) would be cavity walls

That's plausible

https://www.sciwindows.co.uk/

They did my upvc triple glazing and came and priced up some aluminium that we couldn’t go with due to planning regs.
No estate agent hard sell sat in your sofa with “if you sign now then you secure the discount” bullshit.

Had an engineer sent by Ovo around yesterday to upgrade our gas meter as we'd lost the gas supply. As they left, they put this bit of paper on the gas pipe warning about a lack of main equipotential bonding.

However, having done a bit of reading etc I can this this installed within 600mm of the meter itself, isn't this the equipotential bonding? I know nothing about this topic so would appreciate some help.

thanks!

Had a mate who worked for Everest and he wouldn't recommend everest. We went with a local bloke who was super nice and did a bang up job.