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364 lines
15 KiB
Plaintext
Executable File
property
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3355605
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# Cracking up
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![The Middletons][1]
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Taking the strain: Chris Middleton and family
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Christopher Middleton 12:01AM GMT 13 Jan 2007
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[Comments][2]
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* ** [Your View: Tell us your experiences of subsidence][3] **
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**Subsidence is on the increase, so could it be heading your way? Christopher
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Middleton finds cracks in his south London home, and asks the experts for
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help**
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You know how it is when you come back home after a summer holiday. You dump
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your suitcases down in the hall and cast an affectionate eye around the old
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place, noting how reassuringly unchanged everything is.
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Except that when my family and I came back home last summer, something had
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changed. At the point where our kitchen extension had been joined on to the
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house when we left for the airport, there was now a large crack stretching
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from floor to ceiling, with a matching crack down the other wall. What's more,
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these weren't just hairline fissures; they were fully fledged, jagged-toothed
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gaps though which you could see alarming strips of daylight, big enough to
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post a sheet of paper through.
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Our first reaction was to blame my wife's sister, who had been house-sitting
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for us during our fortnight away. On reflection, though, we concluded that the
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presence of one sober, upright head teacher was hardly likely to have caused
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this kind of architectural mayhem. Which left us with one other explanation
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for our extension having decided (after six years) to part company with the
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rest of the house. Yes, our family home was suffering from the structural
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condition that dare not speak its name. Subsidence.
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Time was, just uttering the dreaded S-word was enough to cast a medieval-style
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curse upon your property. Confessing to a case of subsidence was tantamount to
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painting a large red cross on the front door that for decades to come would
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send potential purchasers scurrying away in fear.
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## Related Articles
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* [Subsidence: what you need to know][4]
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17 Feb 2010
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"Don't worry, dear," said my mother, when I rang her with the news. "They can
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do wonders these days. You are insured, aren't you?" Good point. I rushed
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straight to the great, bulging file marked "House", where I keep all documents
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relating not just to our present home, but to the one we moved out of 10 years
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ago. Like many householders, I respect and fear all official documentation,
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while not actually bothering to read it.
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With fingers flustered by the thought of having to fork out £50,000 for
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industrial-scale underpinning, I managed to locate the section in the policy
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booklet entitled "Subsidence". I discovered that, although we were going to
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have pay the first £1,000, our insurers (the Halifax) were going to cough up
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the other £49,000.
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That was the theory. The first thing the man from the Halifax wanted us to
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understand was that the remedial process was going to take months. That said,
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it took him two minutes flat to identify the cause of the problem.
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"Trees," he announced, peering out into the back garden. "In a long, hot
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summer, like the one we've just had, your trees become thirsty, their roots
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suck out all the moisture from the London clay - and you get subsidence."
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It couldn't perhaps be a broken drain, we inquired. "No chance," came the
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reply. "It's definitely trees. Could be that big one next door - what is it, a
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ginkgo?" That's right, we gulped; it's a ginkgo. And the reason we knew was
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because the tree was our neighbours' pride and joy. All of a sudden, we were
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facing the ugly prospect of having to knock on their door and ask not if we
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could borrow a cup of sugar, but if we could take a chainsaw to the soaring
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splendour that was their ginkgo biloba.
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"First, though," said our man with the clipboard, "we'll have to take soil and
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root samples."
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You could almost hear the sighs of relief. Five minutes earlier, we had been
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grumbling about how long it was going to take. Now, we were glad of any excuse
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to put off the suburban Armageddon that had been looming. In this part of
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south-west London, asking your neighbours to cut down their favourite tree is
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akin to turning up on their doorstep with an execution warrant for their
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hamster.
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Three cheers, then, for British insurance justice, which says that before any
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tree can be convicted of subversive underground activities, evidence has to be
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gathered. Hence the arrival, 12 days later, of two men carrying what looked
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like an oversize Stilton cheese-corer, but which turned out to be a device for
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extracting earth from the ground next to our extension. The only problem was
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that the hand-held version couldn't dig down far enough, so the men had to
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come back a fortnight later with a hydraulically-operated version that looked
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like something out of an Alaskan oil-prospecting operation. This one reached
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down to 3.8 metres, removing a neat, cylindrical cross-section of earth, clay
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and tiny tree roots. Once the soil had been taken off for tests, two more
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scene-of-crime officers turned up, one of them re-measuring the cracks ("not
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much change"), the other assessing the dimensions of the trees and the likely
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rapaciousness of their roots.
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As to whodunnit - the curly willow, the silver birch, the hawthorn, the ginkgo
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- none of these operatives was venturing an opinion. Just as radiographers
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won't tell you the results of your X-rays, so this branch of the arboreal
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police (not so much CID as TreeID) wasn't going to give away the identity of
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the offending genus.
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According to the Royal Horticultural Society, most root-related damage is done
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by trees standing 10 metres or less from the house. "Rough rule of thumb,"
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says Neil Curling, claims manager for Halifax Home Insurance, "is that if
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you've got a 15ft-high tree, it should be at least 15 feet away from the
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house. That said, it's not a precise science."
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All of which means there's an element of guesswork in any tree-chopping
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enterprise. The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) recommends
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that if you're not happy with your insurance company's post-investigation
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conclusion (that is, raze every tree to the ground), you should get advice
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from an independent party, in the form of a surveyor.
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"A brief report will cost you between £250 and £500," says Tim Barton, of
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Hungerford-based surveyors Dreweatt Neate. "In many cases, this can be money
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well spent. What you have to remember is that insurance companies send in
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their own advisers and loss adjusters, with a view to minimising the cost to
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themselves."
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It makes sense, of course. You don't have to be a financial wizard to work out
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that an insurance company would rather monitor the situation over a period of
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months, rather than send the bulldozers straight in and start underpinning.
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Not that we'd have been overjoyed by the prospect anyway.
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"Underpinning is a messy, disruptive solution," says RICS expert Roy Ilott.
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"You're talking about excavating under the foundations of a house, and filling
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that space with concrete. Even then, it's not 100 per cent effective. I've
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been in underpinned houses that have then moved again.
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"When subsidence first started to be a problem in the 1970s, everyone went for
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underpinning, and insurance claims went through the roof. Nowadays, most
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people try alternative treatments first."
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One fundamental problem is that houses built before 1930 have foundations only
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0.6 metres deep, as opposed to today's recommended depth of one metre (1.25
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metres on clay). Even those homes built before 1950 only go down 0.7 metres.
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So when hot weather and thirsty tree roots drain the ground of moisture, the
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soil becomes less compact and the house on top starts to shift.
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Take the tree roots out of the equation, then, and you should have a fighting
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chance, shouldn't you? Not necessarily. "If you remove an established tree,
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you can upset a status quo which the surrounding ground was happy with," says
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Mr Ilott, "which can lead to further ground movement."
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So to sum up the news for all us subsidence-sufferers: underpinning is an
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expensive nightmare and may not work, while chopping down trees may make the
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situation worse. Short-term, all we can do is sit and wait and fill the gaps
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in the wall with bathroom tile grouting, so the winter winds won't get in.
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Long-term, provided the extension stops moving, we can have a sort of house-
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hernia operation, whereby a steel mesh is inserted into the corner walls, and
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the grouting is replaced by a permanent, heavy-duty resin. In other words, we
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superglue the house back together.
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"If it's any consolation," says our insurance man, "there are a lot of people
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round here [Southfields] in the same position. We've got half a dozen cases in
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the next two or three streets." As to whether any of these count as genuinely
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serious subsidence, The Sunday Telegraph's resident builder, Jeff "On The
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Level" Howell, is sceptical.
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Subsidence has been getting a lot of publicity due to the dry weather, but
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serious subsidence damage is actually quite rare," he says. "Cracks that
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appear following sustained periods of drought are often no cause for concern,
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as they are quite likely to close up again in the winter when the clay
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expands." Which is just the kind of thing we want to hear. What we're less
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keen to be told is that 2006 was the hottest and driest since records began,
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350 years ago.
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'It'll be a few months before last summer's claims start to show up in
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industry statistics," says Malcolm Tarling, of the Association of British
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Insurers. "Though the conditions might well lead us to expect a fair amount of
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subsidence in certain parts of the country."
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Worst-affected areas, as always, are going to be those south of the imaginary
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line that stretches from the Severn to the Humber. Here, the predominant soil
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is clay, which has a natural propensity to shrink when moisture levels are
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low. Since 1980, more than 150,000 houses in this area are estimated to have
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suffered from subsidence.
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"In a quiet year, we'll handle perhaps 3,000 subsidence claims," says Neil
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Curling. "In a busy year, that figure can go up to 6,000. So far, it looks as
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if 2006 is going to be somewhere in between those two figures. It was hot,
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yes, but for some reason, there was very little subsidence in the south-west
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of England. Instead it was all concentrated in the South-East."
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So given that ground-heave afflicts so many homes within the M25, does that
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mean there won't be such a stigma attached to our, ahem, condition? In years
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to come, will potential purchasers be less inclined to run a mile, when they
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find out we've had a wobbly extension?
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"If you can show you have had work successfully carried out to remedy the
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problem, that should be a bonus," says Mr Ilott encouragingly. "It's a bit
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like having a certificate showing you've had the house treated for woodworm.
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It demonstrates the problem no longer exists. "At least that's the logical
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approach. Trouble is, when people are looking to buy a house, they don't tend
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to act logically."
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Thanks. Pass the grouting, please.
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**Causes of subsidence**
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Thirsty tree roots are responsible for 70 per cent of all subsidence cases
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* Hot weather can cause the water table to drop and clay soil to contract
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* Leaking pipe or drain - water washes soil away from foundations
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* New paving or tarmac reduces the amount of water percolating into the
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subsoil
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* Shallow foundations. In houses built before 1930, they can be only half as
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deep as in those constructed post-1980
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**Who to lean on?**
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* The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, 0870 333 1600,
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[www.rics.org][5] publishes a free leaflet, Subsidence - What Every Property
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Owner Should Know. It canalso provide you with contact details for surveyors
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in your area.
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* Morgan Clark, 08000 975156, [www.morganclark.co.uk][6] act as independent
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advocates for householders involved in substantial subsidence claims. They
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charge 8.5 per cent of the total insurance claim settlement.
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* Subsidence Claims Advisory Bureau, 01424 733727,
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[www.subsidencebureau.com][7] offers insurance to homeowners who are finding
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it hard to get PUPs (Previously Underpinned Properties) insured. advertisement
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Free telephone advice, £125 fee for insurance assessment.
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* 'Tree Root Damage to Building' by Dr Giles Biddle is available to
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Telegraph readers for the special price of £69.95 (inc p&p), rather than the
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normal price of £95.
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**Legal implications**
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**The buyer**
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* **Can you sue a surveyor for failing to spot a house that has cracks, or,
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subsequent to purchase, starts to subside?**
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"The test is whether you can find another expert in the same field who will
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say not only that the first surveyor was negligent, but that any competent
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surveyor would have spotted the defects," says the Telegraph's property clinic
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expert David Fleming, head of property litigation at William Heath & Co (see
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[Property Clinic][8]).
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* **Can you sue a vendor for disguising cracks?**
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"Unlikely," says David. "As always, the rule 'buyer beware' applies."
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**The seller**
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* **If you're selling a house, are you legally obliged to declare obvious
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cracks? Would it be foolhardy to declare the presence of subsidence in the
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house's past?**
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"It's common in commercial property transactions for solicitors to ask if the
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property has suffered from things such as subsidence and accidental damage,
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but less common in residential transactions," says David. "Even if the buyer's
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solicitors ask questions, it's quite common for the vendor's solicitors not to
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volunteer any information, but to refer the buyer to his or her own surveyor's
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report on the property. As for admitting to subsidence, there is no obligation
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on the vendor to come clean."
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**Both parties**
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* **Will the introduction of Homebuyer Information Packs make any difference
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as to whether you can or can't disguise cracks or sue surveyors?**
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"It's hard to see how, when a report has been carried out on behalf of a
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vendor, the surveyor can then be pursued Fleming. Roy Ilott, of the RICS,
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says: "There have been cases where judges have ruled that a surveyor working
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for a vendor does have a duty of care towards a third, unknown party, that is
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the buyer. There's always that outside possibility."
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* **Does past subsidence affect the valuation of the property by the
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mortgage company?**
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"The surveyor inspecting the property for a mortgage company would probably
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not have been informed about the place's history," says Roy. "Mostly, the only
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briefing the surveyor gets is to be told where to pick up the keys and how to
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gain access to the property. So, although her or she may report signs of past
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cracks that have been filled, they won't see any current evidence of
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subsidence provided the work has been carried out properly."
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[What are these?][10]
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* Share: [Share][9] [ ][11] [ ][12]
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[Tweet][13]
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/3355605/Cracking-up.html
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Telegraph
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## [Property][14]
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Related Partners
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* [Innovative design from Alessi][15]
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External Links
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* ### [Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors][5]
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[X][9] Share & bookmark
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Delicious Facebook Google Messenger Reddit Twitter
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Digg Fark LinkedIn Google Buzz StumbleUpon Y! Buzz
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[What are these?][10]
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Share:
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* [ ][9]
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* [ ][11]
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* [ ][12]
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* [Tweet][13]
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* Advertisement
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![][16]
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telegraphuk
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Please enable JavaScript to view the [comments powered by Disqus.][17] [blog
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