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There's a good chance I may have some subsidence happening at one corner of my end of terrace house.
Has anyone been through the claims process with their insurer? Specifically Admiral*
*Yeah I know
are you sure it's more than seasonal movement? what type of soil are you on? age of the property? Any drains in that area of the house?
in terms of insurers they are likely to want to monitor the situation for a long time before they make any sort of call.
it will impact your house price and insurance costs drastically so best to be super sure maybe worth paying for your own independent engineer first
Could just be seasonal movement, but that corner of the house does have adrain running near it.
I'm on free draining loamy soil and it's 1930 brick house
I've not got any brickwork cracking, but I've got floorboards shifting, telltales on window and doorframes and wallpaper crinkling where walls as ceilings meet
I had a home buyers report done when I bought 2.5 years ago which didn't flag any subsidence up then
We’ve got one going on at the moment. Row of six and we own two in the middle. Next door came home for dinner and found cracks in the walls big enough to get your fist into! The insurance are all over it like a rash with crack monitoring and bore holes etc. It seems to have stabilised now so in six months or so they will do remedial works.
I'd be keeping a watch on it. if you can clear some of the paper off to expose the crack. I had some fairly scary looking cracks in mine but in reality all quite small compared to real subsidence. I've filled and so far 18 months later they are still smooth (and new cracks appeared in another room!)
maybe worth getting a drain examination or even buying / hiring a camera to check yourself. collapsed or leaking drain could cause you issues
not a professional but if your house has been ok for 90 odd years it's likely to not be anything major...unless your area has history or something has changed.
I think they say start worrying when you can fit a biro in the crack
I noticed this morning that for the first time in 13 years the flags on my front porch are beginning to move and the pointing is cracking; I reckon it's because the underlying soil is drying out. The lawn has shrunk leaving a 1" gap all round so I think this year will be a bumper year for subsidence claims due to drying out.
Not yet, but was thinking about it. However after reading this thread perhaps I should wait a bit longer.
We're on clay and half the house is old (200+ years) with minimal foundations. Seems like the ground has shrunk underneath that half a bit. Give it winter and I imagine we'll even up again.
Two experiences, the first a block of 6 flats built in clay had bricks breaking clean in half. Insurers blamed it on a nearby tree and did some pruning and repaired the brick damage. A tree surveying friend said it was absolutely nothing to do with the tree. Insurance went up a lot but not my problem anymore.
For the next one the front of the house near enough fell off. It turned out to be a collapsed drain. I wasn't part of the claim but it seems the insurance dealt with it.
Unless your area has a real history of subsidence I'd get the drains checked first and if it is thenm work out who's responsible before taking to insurance.
Years ago I got my Garage replaced. Took ages to sort out, measuring then back a few months later to remeasure and so on.
Eventually the ground was piled and a metal framework fitted then a concrete base. The excess was 1k.