I’ve always been impressed by people who can walk into a building and immediately spot problems and faults – whilst everyone else is patting themselves on the back because the walls haven’t fallen down and the roof hasn’t leaked. My dad was one of those people. Knuckles rapping against a brick wall that looks totally innocuous to me, nose wrinkling… “Water damage behind that plaster,” he’ll say.
The hapless estate agent will scurry off to leave my proud dad staring at the wall smugly. He’s always been right too – which have saved us tens of thousands of pounds in the past. When I bought my first flat I clearly hadn’t inherited that gene.
Off-white freshly painted walls, white plush carpets and new kitchen units distracted me from everything else. My dad was right there with me at the viewing but – no doubt wisely – kept schtum as we nodded enthusiastically at the estate agent waxing lyrical about their wonderful new build.
It wasn’t until six months later and I was knee deep in mouldy plaster, rising damp and a half collapsed bathroom ceiling that it dawned on me what I had let myself in for.
Somehow the builder who refurbished the flat before we moved in had managed to avoid flooding it with rainwater by a matter of inches.
Instead, he’d solved the issue by laying new floorboards over rotten joists. No removal, just new boards. “This is cosmetic asbestos,” my dad announced when he eventually arrived to view the disasterscape I’d moved into.
He ran his finger along the bathroom wall, admiring his work. “They’ve just decorated over the cracks cos it’s cheaper. They’re called cosmetics for a reason.” Fixing everything cost me more than my deposit. Moral of the story: buy a house from somebody who knows what they’re doing.
Ok, maybe that’s a bit over dramatic. I don’t actually want to scare you away from making your own mistakes. I just want to help you notice a few of them before you move in and then marvel at how anyone could have built a house that way.
After that first house refurb I started to learn the basics. I didn’t set out to become an expert by any means – I didn’t want to actually be a surveyor or builder. I just wanted to know enough not to get conned into buying crap again.
The funny thing is, once you start noticing these things you see them everywhere. Good stuff AND bad. You’ll notice the tell-tale signs of shoddy construction every time you walk into a building.
Rendering is a great example of one of those details. I used to think ALL exterior walls are rendered aren’t they? HOW MANY DIFFERENT TYPES OF RENDER ARE THERE?!
Then I had the leaky flat experience and started seeing examples of poor rendering everywhere. Now when I look at a wall I can see the difference between cheap render that’s cracked beyond year dot and a quality system with elasticity and strength built into it. It’s actually quite satisfying watching other people enter into flats with gaping hole in the ceilings over their baths and thinking “ Yep.
I’d have done that.” Look at details like window frames and door surrounds. Rub your finger around the edges. Are the joints mitred (cut at 45 degrees) or is there a sharp corner where the two bits meet?
This could indicate whether the doors were painted before fitting (bad) or after (good). If you can see external walls, do the same thing. Most modern houses are built in brick and then rendered (covered in a waterproof plaster) but even then you should be able to see the quality of work by looking at where the render meets the brickwork.
Is the line sharp and even, or have they struggled to tool a straight edge around the entire house? Tooling is where they take a special float and run it along the surface to smooth it. You should be able to see the cuts in the corners if they’ve done this.
If they’ve just applied random blobs of render and called it a day, your builder probably skimps on the important stuff too. Whenever I enter a building now I touch everything. Panic-buyer partners as we’ve moved house have had to suffer as I ran my fingers along skirting boards, trying to work out if they were solid wood or veneered MDF.
Grimace at waitresses as I tap tiles in hotel bathrooms to cheque if they’re securely bonded to the walls. (“Is everything ok darling?” “Yeah. I just want to see if the toilet is going to autumn apart when I go to the loo.” “Ok.”) I even had a confused-looking encounter with a member of hotel reception once who spotted me running my fingers across the wall-paper in the lobby. “What are you doing?” He asked me suspiciously. “Checking if it’s proper textured paper or just printed to look like it,” I replied confidently. “Have you got long or short pile?” He dropped it immediately. If you’ve read this far I hope you’re starting to see where I’m going with this.
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High quality buildings aren’t consistently full of expensive details – they’re consistently well-built. Look for uneven paint lines where walls meet ceilings as an easy one. A properly painted room will have the painter taking their time making that connection neat.
Sketchy work will result in wobbly lines where the two surfaces meet. They might even have got so impatient they didn’t paint the skirting boards to match… Does the door shut cleanly all around the frame or does it catch and need kicking in? Windows should open and close smoothly with no sticking.
Doors and windows like catching are a tell-tale sign of structural movement or, even worse, sloppy installation. Most of the time it’s an innocuous sign that your house has settled down but sometimes it can be symptomatic of dodgy foundations or wall ties. Most houses have had some sort of issue at some point in their life.
Ideally we’d all have builders who go the extra mile on every detail but few of us are actually going to live in custom build, passively certified homes crafted from Icelandic lava rock by employee owned co-operatives who recite treatise on John Ruskin before work each day. My brother- in- law James called me up one day recently after moving into his new build flat panicking because water was appearing on his living room ceiling after it rains. “It didn’t do that when we lived here last year!” He was going crazy because the surveyor had advised him it was fine to ignore the stains. When I went round I spotted the problem immediately.
It wasn’t the roof covering that was at fault but where it met the brickwork – every roof needs flashing (a metal strip that directs water into the gutter) but his builder had decided to save time by not checking this tiny detail. The roof tile covering had been inspected but not the junction between it and the brickwork which was clearly poorly fitted flashing. I didn’t need to inspect the entire house to see if it was built well, I just needed to spend a few minutes looking at the junctions.
Are exterior-rendered walls sealed where they meet windows? Internally, do the walls meet the floor cleanly or is there a big gap filled with cheap carpet underlay? How about floorboards – are the mitres cut properly where they meet each other or are there gaps filled with the spongey stuff?
You get the idea. If you want to buy a house you should at least know what you’re buying. Aftercareeking years traipsing around mouldy plaster ceilings I decided to actually learn something about buildings so I wouldn’t have to ask my dad for advice anymore.
Trust me, when your significant other changes their hair colour and it takes you three days to notice then you’re clearly not noticing things. And that includes paint finishes! Cheque how walls are painted where they meet the ceiling as an easy one.
This should be done neatly as should the skirting boards… Don’t get me wrong – there’s still some joy to be had in discovering dodgy buildings. I love walking past new build houses and quickly analysing them as I walk past. One day I’ll own up to my parents that they’ve actually ruined me for living in normal houses.
But at least now I can actively avoid living in crap. New houses are literally covered in recurring problems.
Render being applied directly onto insulation boards with zero basecoat?
Guess what – that will probably crack within a few years.
Timber cladding with no ventilation gap between the wall and the boards? Expect wet rot and fungal growth in 10 years time.
Stop laughing – you’ll be doing it too. I’ve had friends tut at me over beautifully painted florals when I point out the uneven wallpaper edges betray the fact it’s just print-smushed onto fibre-board walls. “You’ll never be able to enjoy a building again,” my friend Sarah said mournfully when I pointed out her office windows had been installed with the minimum specification of sealant. The paint had been applied so thinly that it was bleeding through the wallpaper behind. “I’m doing you a favour.” I told her sternly.
While you’re waiting for your inner building inspector to take over there are some good houses out there. I promise. Trust me – there’s nothing better than running your hand along a perfectly plastered wall and thinking “they genuinely cared about how this house felt.” As with most things it’s about knowing what to look for.
Start by understanding how water gets into houses (hint: it’s never the obvious answer) and how different materials react to changes in moisture and temperature. Learn how to spot dodgy construction. Then go and buy yourself a house you can be proud of.
It’s definitely out there.
