Cracked external wall, would you buy?

[shermy]

Hi there,

I hope I'm posting this in the right category.

I'm hoping to get a picture of the mindset of buyers, mostly investors, about the following conundrum.

my parents are about to place their Gold Coast home onto the market.

It's a 4bdr brick veneer house, opposite a canal (not on a canal), pool, dble grge and very handy to the beach.

However, about 4 years ago, a large crack appeared in the south wall. It follows the mortar line in a "step up" pattern. It runs from the graound to the top of the eaves. It has moved the eaves about 2 cm and a gap has opened near a window (although only extrenally, no sign of movement internally)

So far, friends who are builders have made some very rough guestimates about cause and cost of repair.

For the upcoming sale I have suggested that maybe the best way to deal with this is to get an qualified engineer/builder to inspect and basically state whether
the house is safe and structually sound
the probable cause (suspect the drought)
and a guide on the solution including price.

Then for instance if the quote is $50k repair, knock $50k staright off the price and get the agent to be honset and up front about this issue.

My questions for the SS crew are,

who would most likely buy a property in this condition
is this a good strategy or can you advise of another
is deducting the whole repair cost wise, considering a buyer will still want to cut the price further?

any suggestion welcome

oh, and there is no real possibility of the place being repaired by my fokks before sale. that rules that out.

cheers

 

[The Y-man]

Do what any buyer is likely to do - get a prepurchase building inspection report done.

Got any photos of the wall?

The Y-man

 

[Annietom]

I agree with Y-man. It is up to a buyer to find these defects, I think it would be prudent for your agent to suggest the buyer get their own report done, but I wouldn't be keen on pricing etc. That crack could be for so many reasons. Let the buyer get advice they are happy to rely on, don't make it your advice, which they rely on, and later find to be incorrect.

that's the way I'd handle it.

 

[Chui]

I read somewhere that an owner fixed their problem by pouring a bucket of water down one side of the building each day, as it was sitting on clay. The clay swells and started to close the gap.

Your mileage may vary.

 

[Luv2Travel]

I sold a property a couple of years ago which had a cracking issue. It had some hairline cracks when I purchased (which according to the pre-purchase inspection were nothing to worry about), but they slowly grew over the eight years I had it. They were in various places and also moved to the plaster, very scary to watch!

I thought it'd cost thousands and be a huge mess to fix, so tried to sell it in that condition. The agent I listed with said it wouldn't really be an issue for buyers, I wasn't convinced, but thought I'd try my luck. The property sat there for about two months with the same old feed back "beautifully presented, but scared of the cracks". After about 2 months I finally got an offer about 10% below what I knew it should get, by a builder who tried to use a scare tactic, saying the place was in a terrible state. It scared me enough to get my own building inspection done, but not to take his pathetic low ball offer.

The inspection revealed it was just settling and due to the drought, and that articulation joints would help with it. So, I took it off the market and got a builder in to quote replacing all the cracked bricks, which were on two sides of the building and put in the articulation joints and a plasterer to mend all the plaster once the brickwork was done. All up it only cost me $2,000 which I am still amazed at the price, as is anyone I tell. I re-painted the affected areas myself and put it back on the market a couple of months later and it sold at the first open for the full asking price that I wanted (this was not a rising market).

I know you say your parents can't get it fixed, but based on my experience, cracking terrifies people and could devalue it a lot more than the cost to fix, as it did for me. My place was a little unit, which would have been appealing to investors and first home buyers, but NO ONE wanted to touch it.

 

[RumpledElf]

Our house has cracks in it. It is a rendered limestone house, and the cracks are all around the 'ties' that hold the house square. In this case, the cracks are all compression cracks - they bulge outwards and if left long enough will pop off the top layer, and in fact have done so in a couple places inside. This is from movement in the stone and the ties holding the stone in. They are quite minor in the grand scheme of thing and they are more apparent in this kind of construction because the 'mortar' is dirt and quite easy to crush out from between the stones. Don't see it in modern houses because bricks and mortar are much stronger vs compression forces.

Now, if these were expansion cracks - the sort that open up - I'd be more concerned. I've seen those get absolutely enormous, worst case I've seen were some cracks I could stick my entire arm through and the wall looked like it was going to fall off - the seller of that one had a quote to underpin the house. It was a very large number