Wall cracks / reactive Soil? - Horsham

[Jing]

Hi all,

I recently went to inspect some properties in Horsham but noticed quite a few of them have cracks on the walls etc.
The RE agents mentioned that horsham has very reactive soil hence when the land moves the walls crack, which is why the properties are built on high foundation so they can keep jacking it up as land compresses.

I will obviously do building inspection and find structural engineer if need be, but was just wanting to see if anyone has come across this before and if the RE agents are just spinning bulldust?

Some of the properties have quite serious cracks, so should I even waste my time and money with them doing building inspections?

thanks in advance

 

[Kinnon Bell]

I have a couple of properties in Horsham and they're telling you the truth. One of the places has quite a bit of damage (no serious structural so far), just looks ugly. Some areas are worse than others. Keep an eye out for flood zones too as it was badly affected by the floods s couple of years ago.

 

[Jing]

I have a couple of properties in Horsham and they're telling you the truth. One of the places has quite a bit of damage (no serious structural so far), just looks ugly. Some areas are worse than others. Keep an eye out for flood zones too as it was badly affected by the floods s couple of years ago.

Thanks for your reply

It's assuring to hear from someone who has properties in Horsham! So do you generally just ignore the cracks if the building inspection has no issues with structural damage? or do you think it's still best to avoid the properties which have larger cracks?

 

[kum yin lau]

Hi, I bought a decrepit house with cracks + other things that I didn't know about. I did a building inspection too.

I'd say don't bother to pay for building inspection. Your eyes have already told you a lot.

Buy those with big cracks only if there are other compensating factors. For example, I bought at a price 30K less than the next offer. The owners accepted my offer because they probably knew that the conditional offers would fall over.

I bought because the value of the land was far more than the value of the house. 12 months later, the land was valued at 345K and the house $500 only!

In hindsight? I'd have done better if I'd bought the one without the cracks.

KY

 

[vaughan]

Most of Sydney is like this too.

I inspected a house years ago that had big cracks in all the arches over the hallway that ran the length of the house. It was slowly subsiding on one side.

 

[octain]

Dido. I got two houses in horsham. I've been though almost every place on the market there. Their is lots of places that are cracking due to reactive soil. I even had problems with it in my place in melbourne. From what I understand though. The soil can change even up to a few hundred metres away.

So if you find a place with cracks all over it. dont just write off that whole area.
just maybe go to the end of that street and you should be ok. Both my places have very few cracks and building inspection showed their stable. Which is good.

Get the house stumps checked. I found the houses in Horsham west where more stable.

 

[beech]

Dido. I got two houses in horsham. I've been though almost every place on the market there. Their is lots of places that are cracking due to reactive soil. I even had problems with it in my place in melbourne. From what I understand though. The soil can change even up to a few hundred metres away.

So if you find a place with cracks all over it. dont just write off that whole area.
just maybe go to the end of that street and you should be ok. Both my places have very few cracks and building inspection showed their stable. Which is good.

Get the house stumps checked. I found the houses in Horsham west where more stable.

Yes, good post..

Kesse,have you noticed the cracks getting bigger or have you checked during winter when it's not as dry that they close up?

Thnaks

 

[ems]

This is an issue with us currently. Viewed a unit yesterday, about 10 in the complex and this unit was ground floor. There were big cracks in nearly every room and we are wondering what could be causing it. Outside had a few cracks but nowhere near as many inside. Looking at the outside of all the other units they all looked fine apart from this one unit. It's strange why only the one unit has the problem...

 

[Kinnon Bell]

Yes, good post..

Kesse,have you noticed the cracks getting bigger or have you checked during winter when it's not as dry that they close up?

Thnaks

I haven't been back since we did the renos about 2.5 years ago but from what I understand one place is fine, haven't had much movement and the other the cracks are reappearing/getting worse - not too sure if they're closing up or not.

One place we eventually plan to demolish and subdivide but as luck would have it, it's the one holding itself together.

 

[beech]

Oh no,I was hoping you we're subdividing the problematic property.

 

[Michael.Knight]

So if one of your properties does have cracks in it, what can the builders do to fix it? Is it a major job?