We have a 50 year old house which we extended last year. The builder is a reputable local firm and we used a structural engineer which led to masses of very expensive steelwork. We have building regs all signed off.
The extension was finished in December. The builder says he will come back and fix anything that goes wrong within the first 6 months. This is our second extension (last one was in another house) and our previous builder was a member of FMB. We paid for a 10 year guarantee on that extension and true to his word, the builder came back and fixed several niggly things over the years. He was a much smaller firm and couldn't have tackled the house we have just extended.
The original house was rectangular in shape and had a double garage attached. We demolished this garage as it was single skinned and lacked adequate foundations. We then built a two-storey side extension and single storey rear extension, so it's a 'wraparound' in total.
The double storey side extension consists of two bathrooms and a bedroom. The bathrooms run across the front of the house, so above the garage door there are two bathroom windows side by side. These rooms are separated by a stud wall. The bedroom is behind them and runs across the width of the extension.
About 6 weeks after we moved back into the house, we noticed that the bedroom floor had become very creaky around the entrance to the ensuite bathroom. The bedroom is carpeted and has a metal runner on the boundary with the ensuite floor tiles. This runner is now sitting proud of the floor tiles and the door scrapes across it when closed.
Secondary to this we noticed that the door into the family bathroom was jamming on the door frame. This became progressively worse and it's now very difficult to close it properly.
The grouting around the bathroom floors was falling to bits (both rooms have electric underfloor heating with theraml boarding and tiles on top). I posted on this forum and got some advice. The tiler came back and removed the grouting to replace it with flexible sealant. By the time he came to do the work, a large gap had opened beneath the stud wall separating the two bathrooms (I'd say it was 3mm) with a corresponding crack in the ceiling running in the same diection but about 1mm deep.
We now also have a crack in the door frame around the entrance to the bedroom. The crack runs horizontally and I guess you'd say it's slightly more than a hairline crack.
We have drawn our builder's attention to these issues and he has dismissed them as 'settlement' which I accept might be true. He hasn't been upstairs to look at the problem.
Today I spoke to the structural engineer. They have offered to come and look at the extension and report their findings for a fee of £150 plus VAT. This is a lot of money to us at the moment but I'm concious that our builder will only make good any problems within the first six months.
The engineer firm said they would look at it and if they thought it was 'over and above' what could be expected then they would ask the builder to open the affected area up and see what's happening. If they find nothing to critisize the builder for then we will have to pay for remedial action to put the house back to where it was.
We obviously have buildings insurance.
Can anyone advise what would be the ebst course of action and whether these sorts of signs are 'normal settlement'? I'm aware there is another current thread where floor joists appear to have sunk and there is a feeling that the underfloor heating might be responsible but would this affect the floor joists in our bedrrom and make them creak? Would it have led to the crack in the door frame for the bedroom. We didn't have these problems in the last house but didn't have underfloor heating either.
Advice gratefully received.
The extension was finished in December. The builder says he will come back and fix anything that goes wrong within the first 6 months. This is our second extension (last one was in another house) and our previous builder was a member of FMB. We paid for a 10 year guarantee on that extension and true to his word, the builder came back and fixed several niggly things over the years. He was a much smaller firm and couldn't have tackled the house we have just extended.
The original house was rectangular in shape and had a double garage attached. We demolished this garage as it was single skinned and lacked adequate foundations. We then built a two-storey side extension and single storey rear extension, so it's a 'wraparound' in total.
The double storey side extension consists of two bathrooms and a bedroom. The bathrooms run across the front of the house, so above the garage door there are two bathroom windows side by side. These rooms are separated by a stud wall. The bedroom is behind them and runs across the width of the extension.
About 6 weeks after we moved back into the house, we noticed that the bedroom floor had become very creaky around the entrance to the ensuite bathroom. The bedroom is carpeted and has a metal runner on the boundary with the ensuite floor tiles. This runner is now sitting proud of the floor tiles and the door scrapes across it when closed.
Secondary to this we noticed that the door into the family bathroom was jamming on the door frame. This became progressively worse and it's now very difficult to close it properly.
The grouting around the bathroom floors was falling to bits (both rooms have electric underfloor heating with theraml boarding and tiles on top). I posted on this forum and got some advice. The tiler came back and removed the grouting to replace it with flexible sealant. By the time he came to do the work, a large gap had opened beneath the stud wall separating the two bathrooms (I'd say it was 3mm) with a corresponding crack in the ceiling running in the same diection but about 1mm deep.
We now also have a crack in the door frame around the entrance to the bedroom. The crack runs horizontally and I guess you'd say it's slightly more than a hairline crack.
We have drawn our builder's attention to these issues and he has dismissed them as 'settlement' which I accept might be true. He hasn't been upstairs to look at the problem.
Today I spoke to the structural engineer. They have offered to come and look at the extension and report their findings for a fee of £150 plus VAT. This is a lot of money to us at the moment but I'm concious that our builder will only make good any problems within the first six months.
The engineer firm said they would look at it and if they thought it was 'over and above' what could be expected then they would ask the builder to open the affected area up and see what's happening. If they find nothing to critisize the builder for then we will have to pay for remedial action to put the house back to where it was.
We obviously have buildings insurance.
Can anyone advise what would be the ebst course of action and whether these sorts of signs are 'normal settlement'? I'm aware there is another current thread where floor joists appear to have sunk and there is a feeling that the underfloor heating might be responsible but would this affect the floor joists in our bedrrom and make them creak? Would it have led to the crack in the door frame for the bedroom. We didn't have these problems in the last house but didn't have underfloor heating either.
Advice gratefully received.