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Buying a house with foundation issues?


Limitedslip7

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Has anyone bought a house with foundation issues and repaired them successfully? I've looked at several houses over the past year with basement walls that have started to buckle inwards. Of course, they were priced like nothing is wrong with the house and it's never mentioned until I actually go to look at it. I'm not interested in just strapping the walls or doing a cheap fix in an attempt to slow/stop the damage, I would want to completely replace the damaged walls. According to online calculators, it would be in the $30-40k range to replace the walls.

 

Anyone done this? Is it fairly straightforward or a big risk? Debating putting in a lowball offer or just walking away...

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I sell to all the basement doctors in town and truefully their fix is pretty good long term. They put several 4"x4" steel beams vertically shown on this page to give you a better idea: https://www.mybasementdoctor.com/products/foundation-repair/the-force-wall-stabilizer.html I wouldnt call it a temporary fix to slow the problem. It should be a complete solution for you.

 

Call Kyle he is the owner at K&G Contracting (614) 878-7075. Tell him Andrew at Suburban sent you. He will come out and look and give you advice.

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the "proper" fix would be to do beams on the inside, excavate the exterior and seal the exterior of the foundation, lay new drainage, backfill the wall with proper material and grading.

 

Of course what kind of buckling are we talking about? In some areas of the city, when the block foundation houses were being built they backfilled too early and then didnt have proper drainage for multiple months and it causes a slow buckle of 1/4" or so and small cracks. They are usually old and not a problem as long as the drainage is managed.

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Just remember when the foundation moves/buckles it causes other points of the house to flex, so there may be more to the damage than just repairing the foundation itself. I was considering a house out in Richwood that had the front corner of the foundation sinking. It ended up causing a crack up the entire side of the house and slant to the floor. Estimated foundation repair (slab style) was $30k but the other damage caused to the house was an additional $45K. Just make sure you know what you're getting into before you pull the trigger.
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Not to threadjack but I have stay dry waterproofing coming over today for an estimate. I have water coming into my basement walls but the walls are not bowing. I wanted to see what tile drainage around my house and pumped out to the street would cost. Anyone else in here have anyone they would recommend? I want more than one estimate.
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Strangely, the last two houses I've looked at with foundation issues have been built on a hill, with the bottom of the basement about level with the surrounding land.

 

The latest one actually has a walkout. It's a full basement with cracks showing along the two long walls. They are buckled in about 1/2" maybe. There were also quite a few holes drilled into the walls; maybe they have tried to repair it before? Haven't gotten the disclosures on the house yet so I'm not sure what they have attempted.

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I can't see why you would ever buy unless you could fix and save enough to come out ahead.

 

 

^^ this. Life tosses enough curve balls my way to want to even look at a house like that. We did years ago over in Little Turtle. Had large metal beams to reinforce the wall and supposedly all the fixes were done perfect, etc....but I walked out and and crossed that shit off the list. Way too many homes out there to justify looking at one with foundation issues.

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Well the problem is I'm kind of picky about what I want. I'm trying to find something in the country but still less than a 30 min drive to work, a larger lot (3 acres minimum, would prefer 5+), preferably wooded. Needs to have a large shop or room to build a large shop. I'd like to have room to shoot guns, ride dirtbikes, etc. No 100 year old farmhouses.

 

Should probably just bite the bullet and build really. Hard to find anything decent around the Marion area.

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My home doesn't have foundation issues, but it did need the entire 30' wide garage slab demo'd out and re-poured as it had buckled (turned out to have had uncompacted and too granular fill material).

 

My advice on your issue is to make an offer/enter into contract contingent on inspection, and then coordinate a foundation repair contractor to be on-site during the same window of time as your home inspector. That way the inspector can note the issue on his report, and the foundation guy can give you a quote on what the repair will cost. In my case, I had quotes on the garage slab which I shared with the sellers representative after inspection, and the seller agreed to pay for half the cost. In my view that was pretty fair given the way the house was already priced.

 

It's a win-win, as you have an understanding of your total investment including repair costs, and you can use that info as a negotiation tool if you choose to move forward.

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I wouldn't let a slightly bowed wall turn me away if the house was what I wanted in the area I wanted. It takes quite a bit of deflection to really cause issues, and easy to keep an eye on it over time and see if it's getting worse or not.

 

You can spend $5k-$10k reinforcing a bowed wall and have it guaranteed for life, easy long-term solution. I had a place with 2 steel i-beams that were 40 years old and totally fine, and another one with the carbon fiber strips that held up fine and was cool to look at.

 

It's a seller's market, good luck bargaining for something like that

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I got a couple quotes to do new perimeter drains inside and add beams in the basement our my house. They were pushing $10-15K and that was 5 years ago.

 

I ended up doing it myself. I would plastic off 20-30' at a time to cut up concrete, drill new weep holes, install new drain pipe, set beams on footer and pour back concrete. I work in construction so the process and work was straight forward, just labor intensive. I had an engineer friend that did the design work.

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Not to threadjack but I have stay dry waterproofing coming over today for an estimate. I have water coming into my basement walls but the walls are not bowing. I wanted to see what tile drainage around my house and pumped out to the street would cost. Anyone else in here have anyone they would recommend? I want more than one estimate.

 

Rogers Basement is who we used.

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Well the problem is I'm kind of picky about what I want. I'm trying to find something in the country but still less than a 30 min drive to work, a larger lot (3 acres minimum, would prefer 5+), preferably wooded. Needs to have a large shop or room to build a large shop. I'd like to have room to shoot guns, ride dirtbikes, etc. No 100 year old farmhouses.

 

Should probably just bite the bullet and build really. Hard to find anything decent around the Marion area.

 

My wife and I were in the same shape when we bought ours. We were looking in the same area, and it really is tough as all the houses are farm or really run down turn of the century homes. I ended up setting on a house in Ashley. It is in town, but the wildlife preserve is a 5 min drive from the house if that. Shooting range is there, hunting, fishing, etc. so it worked out for us. It is still an older home (1894) however, the house was redone to update it. So it worked out in the end.

 

Building is the way to go if you want a more modern home, but even stick built homes are gonna set you back quite a bit, plus you have to buy the lot/land and pay for the utilities to be run (if its not already done) so it adds up quickly.

 

Where are you looking to stay price wise if you don't mind my asking?

 

This is one that caught my eye last night as I was driving home. https://www.herrealtors.com/homes-for-sale/1946-State-Route-229-Ashley-OH-43003-236759838

 

It is well out of my budget but Is an awesome property. Right off the wildlife area on 229.

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I was looking to build a new house in a subdivision. Lot cost was $62K. The 21-2200SF house came in at nearly $330K. I think the "base price" was $240K just going off price/SF. If you can keep it under $250 without pouring concrete yourself let me know. Like Joe said above, the utility taps and site work are ridiculous....even moreso if you are 'out there'.

 

All those costs plus having to fund the construction loan just made anything like that not feasible at this time in my case.

 

10-15K to repair a basement wall, might just be petty if the rest of it is totally worth it.

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I was looking to build a new house in a subdivision. Lot cost was $62K. The 21-2200SF house came in at nearly $330K. I think the "base price" was $240K just going off price/SF. If you can keep it under $250 without pouring concrete yourself let me know. Like Joe said above, the utility taps and site work are ridiculous....even moreso if you are 'out there'.

 

All those costs plus having to fund the construction loan just made anything like that not feasible at this time in my case.

 

10-15K to repair a basement wall, might just be petty if the rest of it is totally worth it.

 

 

But Out there is often septic or well, so it could be a lot less than a long run to city connects.

 

 

The cost to build is dictated most by market, and less by material cost. Like everything else- the more you can do yourself the more you save

 

To the OP I can tell you from experience with a few flips that I have seen long term repairs hold fine and not at all affect resale. This is with both finished and unfinished basements. If you short up the wall and fix the reason why it bowed-you should be good IMO

 

But to answer your question you should absolutely price that into your offer, and hit with a 5% depreciation of value on top.

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One other thing to consider with the area, Marion/Marrow/North Delaware County Is mostly a big water table. So foundation issues are more common than say in Columbus. Usually a home with that going on in this area will be more expensive to repair, and more likely to continue to give issue in the future. So that is something to consider as well.

 

A perfect example is my Aunt and Uncle's old home. They were in the North portion of Union County near the Honda plant. They have had issues with their basement wall 3 times even after repairing (steel beams, sealed, etc.) over the last 12 years. The last time the water pressure was so great it separated the water proof coating and made a blister like a big water bed.

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But Out there is often septic or well, so it could be a lot less than a long run to city connects.

 

 

The cost to build is dictated most by market, and less by material cost. Like everything else- the more you can do yourself the more you save

.

 

 

You did say "could be" which it totally true, but an engineered septic system can easily run $15-20K. Water tap is 5K+, propane also comes with a pretty nice price tag.

 

I think material costs play huge roles. I actually work for a homebuilder, and while my numbers above are retail, I cannot even afford to build and I get the house for cost lol. In theory I could likely go build a house with a Westport or something for much less than my 'at-cost' price... Just due to said material / standards / quality differences.

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You did say "could be" which it totally true, but an engineered septic system can easily run $15-20K. Water tap is 5K+, propane also comes with a pretty nice price tag.

 

I think material costs play huge roles. I actually work for a homebuilder, and while my numbers above are retail, I cannot even afford to build and I get the house for cost lol. In theory I could likely go build a house with a Westport or something for much less than my 'at-cost' price... Just due to said material / standards / quality differences.

 

My Westport is $280k, and the land was bought from Dominion when they went under so the lots where we are building are only about~$30k developed. The only difference between your mid-level builders (Westport, M/I, Trinity) and your high end custom developers (Donley, Romanelli etc) etc are your basic finishes and lots/neighborhoods. We went with quality mid level finishes. There are 2 of the same floorplan of our house that are over $300k.

 

There are only a few of the low end builders left (Centex, Ryan, Maronda) and they have not upped their game on their structure quality and just sell on sq footage alone

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How much movement are we talking about? Theirs a lot of settling that is tolerable by code also wall allowed to bow 3/4" over any 5 foot(maybe 6 ft) span and be acceptable.

 

But I'm with Scott, if you love a house throw an offer out and get a real bid and go from there. Worst case your out a few hundred for the inspection. I'd believe very few people are actually going to have already had their foundation looked at and less are going to disclose it.

 

Sent from my SM-G928V using Tapatalk

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the "proper" fix would be to do beams on the inside, excavate the exterior and seal the exterior of the foundation, lay new drainage, backfill the wall with proper material and grading.

 

Of course what kind of buckling are we talking about? In some areas of the city, when the block foundation houses were being built they backfilled too early and then didnt have proper drainage for multiple months and it causes a slow buckle of 1/4" or so and small cracks. They are usually old and not a problem as long as the drainage is managed.

 

I bought one that had this work done already. I sold it a few years later with no issues.

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I wouldn't ever let bowing basement walls deter you unless the house is literally caving in. I have a number of rentals with bowed walls, some more than 1/2" (a lot). I strap them all with steel beams and they'll last another 100 years.

 

A good number to use is 1 beam every 3-4 feet, and each beam is around $500.

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I can't see why you would ever buy unless you could fix and save enough to come out ahead.

Not to mention, if this went unfixed.. what else wasnt fixed/maintained properly..

 

 

^^ this. Life tosses enough curve balls my way to want to even look at a house like that. Way too many homes out there to justify looking at one with foundation issues.

Unfortunately this isnt true in the current market.. Its rough to be a home buyer right now O.o

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