Browse Forums General Discussion 1 Jul 27, 2008 5:18 pm Hi, recently purchased new home that was built by an owner builder, I was given, certificate of insurance. I am wondering if it is worth the paper it is written on as I have discovered the insulating in the ceiling is either useless (450 wide in 600 space) or not installed at all, also wall insulation the same from what I can detect without ripping wall apart. As some of the ceilings are vaulted (enclosed cathedral) this will become a very expensive rectification, my way of thinking is that the building inspector at a minimum should of got his step ladder, hopped into the roof and said to himself why is the insulation incomplete. I feel so stupid now as when I purchased the property I requested a building inspection, the agent said there has just been one carried out for the insurance so I thought well ok no need for me to get one, your comments would be appreciated. By the way I am in Victoria
Cheers Dave Re: Owner Built Home Defects 2Jul 27, 2008 5:34 pm Hi David, welcome to the forum.
I guess the lesson learned from this is get your own inspection. Agents will say anything and not everyone has a conscience. As far as getting it fixed, I cant help, but hopefully others on here will give you some advise. Paula Re: Owner Built Home Defects 3Jul 27, 2008 7:59 pm There are a lot of old homes without ceiling insulation, the inspector may not have seen this particular house as a problem not having any.
But yes I had a similar problem when I brought my house the owner (who was a sparkie) was doing stuff himself, being minor works and being a tradesman I thought there shouldn't be any probs I was wrong. Luckiley for me there were two window holes in the wall in kitchen/meals area without windows. When installing the windows one being a little too small for the hole and the other being too big (on purpose) I had to enlarge/decrease the framing for the windows, I discovered that the studds were absolute crap and would not have been able to support the windows so I had to reinforce them. Now if I had custom made windows made for those holes I wouldn't have had to redo the framing, but eventually the weight of the windows would've caused problems down the track (If not straight away). There are a few more little things that I had to fix and pretty much I couldn't know before buying the house that this bloke did a subpar job as a lot of the mistakes were behind walls I even had to get a spark to do some electrical work and the previous bloke was a SPARKIE FFS. Owner builder's be carefull with do a inspection and check everything out, most are no probs at all but you get the odd one or two that either have no idea what they are doing or are just plain lazy. As far as your insulation problems it shouldn't be much to fix the ceiling probs insulation is pretty cheap. Re: Owner Built Home Defects 4Jul 27, 2008 9:13 pm Where are you located? If it's in an area like Melbourne that has to have a five star energy rating then this house is out of spec. Contact the local council for a copy of the plans. Building NB Hampton 19e finishing at end july 08 Re: Owner Built Home Defects 5Jul 27, 2008 10:05 pm Hi and thanks for the reply, the house is in north east of melbourne, it was built by the owner/builder over approx 4 years the building permit was issued Aug 2002 and C of O in June 2006, not sure how this affects things Re: Owner Built Home Defects 6Jul 27, 2008 11:31 pm What's the regs on owners builders in Vic. In some other states they carry the same insurance as normal builders I think.
Might be worth checkng that angle re the insector who did the final. But as per above - maybe it's just a simple job of do it yourself. Steve Re: Owner Built Home Defects 7Jul 27, 2008 11:44 pm going to make contact with council tomorrow and obtain all docs, trouble with doing myself is it is not a simple job, vaulted ceilings mean the plaster comes off or the tiles above come off. In my opinion major job. Hi All, I engaged a tradie to install concrete retaining wall 600-800mm high over 32 meters in Victoria. Sleepers are 200*75*2000 mm installed over 17 steel posts. I… 0 6889 1 9464 All 3 items listed are defects and are of concern. Please seek qualified independent inspector and/or legal advice for your state. 1 8203 |