Browse Forums Building A New House 1 Feb 07, 2011 10:05 am Hello everybody, I would like to share my near death experience with PD home lifestyle - Bardot. The house is only 14 months old, and this is what happened 2 days ago when there it was hit by strong wind and heavy rain. The whole ceiling in the living area was collapsed, luckily me and my family left the house in time, otherwise we would be ended up in hospital. The following day after the incident, I checked with other close neighbor, no other house have that huge damaged as mine. Called the maintenance dept. They didn't want covered in the structural warranty anything caused by weather even tough it's a contributed by building defect. asked the insurance to cover it all, I believe if the insurance assessment find it due to building defect they will chase the builder. Either way, it will take a while before it get fixed. Right now I have to live in the house without any ceilings. I will upload some pictures to share, right now it's out of quota. Any suggestion or input to speed up the claim process is highly appreciated. Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 2Feb 07, 2011 10:25 am Luckily it was storm damage and not surge or flood etc. The builder (maintanence dept) if anything has given you the right advice, go through insurance! Because if you wanted a builder to sort it out, you will be waiting for ever! Let the insurance to sort it out, you only worry about managing the insurance company. As for the incident, luckily for everyone noone was hurt! Luckily your family wasn't hurt or else the builder's directors would be a world of trouble! As for the integrity of the house, new age roof trusses should be banned. Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 3Feb 07, 2011 10:29 am Adam Generally its not the truss the is the problem. Like all cases with today builders is that the flashing and or storm water system including guttering and valleys are not design properly. There may be a small leak that allows water to go inside the house and eventually the plaster becomes wet and then eventually the ceiling (some times refereed to as the roof) caves in. Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 4Feb 07, 2011 10:56 am Hi, I agree with Adam, Because the following day, after inspecting the tile roof, it all in-tact. I could only see few spillage from the roof tile, there were no big hole or gap from roof tile or whatsoever. And the floor was almost dry, only few insulation sponge were totally wet, but I reckon it's not that heavy to cause the whole ceiling to collapsed. Yeah, no point talking to builder as they wanted to get away from this incident. The board quota has reached to upload pictures, Do you know where can I post the picture for everybody to see? Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 5Feb 07, 2011 11:03 am in denny. What would have happened that water would have come through and the small amount would have been weakening the plaster all that time with the battts acting like a giant sponge. slowly leaking water and wetting the back of the plaster then whether the plaster was still wet or dry it would and fell down. If the leak was easy to detect PD would have got it right. Just be careful that when it gets repaired it is done properly and that the source is correctly identified otherwise you will be back here again. This is not the first time i heard of this. Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 8Feb 07, 2011 11:56 am I like some others, I assumed you meant that the trusses/roof support structure had collapsed. this is not a structural problem, It's a problem but not structural. Like B STAR said, it could have been guttering/flashing/storm water that caused the problem. The insurance company is definitely the ones to cover this. Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 9Feb 07, 2011 12:15 pm denny_mr http://www.flickr.com/photos/59207621@N05/sets/72157625993014922/ Just saw your pics denny, I've had bad dreams of my roof lifting off due to a storm, but a ceiling falling down! That's just crazy! I can't add to what the best process is, but I am certainly glad that you and your family are alright, that's a horrific experience. Hope it gets sorted out soon cheers jim Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 10Feb 07, 2011 12:29 pm I checked the photos and while i can see some water near you tiles that doesn't appear to be the main issue. If you look closer to the first row of tiles in some the pics they are more wet. It looking like your gutters couldn't keep up. To you have eves on your house??? When the gutters don't keep up the water comes into your house. Maybe also check that the gutter are not clogged up and that water runs freely. Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 11Feb 07, 2011 2:23 pm Hi B Star, water is not from the clogged gutter, as I rub the surrounding wood near the gutter, they are all dry. most likely water was dripping directly from the roof tile. but still I reckoned it's not that much to cause the huge weight to cause the ceiling to collapse Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 12Feb 07, 2011 2:35 pm denny-Mr the gutter doesn't need to be clogged for it to overflow but still worth a check. If there are not enough down pipes and the water from the roof is to great the water may spill into the inside of the house. If that room has fallen then there may be a chance that another room might have a problem. Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 13Feb 07, 2011 3:35 pm Hi B Star, Thank you for the insight. There could be the possibility spillage only in the middle section of the house. However, the front and rear part on the same section was not affected at all. At this point I'm still puzzled about the main cause? after it collapsed I evacuated and left the house. in the morning the following day, there was a heavy downpour but this time without any strong wind. After it ease in the afternoon, I came down and inspect the tile floor was almost dry, no flooding, the wet floor mainly because of the wet insulation which fell down. Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 14Feb 07, 2011 3:49 pm This is the worst thing to have happened to anyone. I have never ever seen anything like this happening. The roof tiles pictures do show that there us leaking happening througout the roof. It's best to leave it to insurance to solve it. Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 15Feb 07, 2011 7:33 pm Denny, thank god you and the family are safe. Our house is less than 4 months old and unfortunately I too had my ceiling collapse in the living room/dining room. I was standing right under it when it collapsed suddenly. Thankfully was managed to get out of it with couple of scratches. Can totally understand what it must like for you as we too are without ceiling since Saturday. We had to pull out all the wet insulation and cover the area with tarp sheets. Both insurance company and builder are inundated with such issues with customer contacting them from everywhere. We have the person from builder coming over tomorrow to inspect the damage. Do you think it should be the builder's responsibility to fix it as we were just due for our post hand over inspection? Insurance guys aren't going to be coming over until Thursday. We're in for another rain on Friday and I am really worried about how far the tarp sheets will hold up. Any advise people if this needs to be insurance issue or builder's? Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 17Feb 07, 2011 8:37 pm Hi rumelb, I thought I'm the only unlucky one. May I know who is your builder? My builder didn't even bother to have any inspection, they said the structural warranty doesn't cover anything to do with weather damage. I also concern about the forecast on Friday. just prepare some clothes and basic necessity to runaway if you sense something bad would happen. normal heavy rain should be okay, as long as no strong wind / hurricane. Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 18Feb 07, 2011 9:04 pm They say, it's good to find some company in pain as the journey to recovery suddenly becomes easier. At least we can share our experiences and support each other as much possible. Our builder was Simonds. We built house recently so are due for the post hand over inspection. I am not quite sure at this stage who is actually going to fix the issue(builder or insurance company) as from the looks of it they'll have to replace the entire ceiling of our open plan kitchen. We notices couple of broken roof tiles which might have been the cause. There are 5 houses in our estate that haven been similarly damaged although most of the cases are of severe leakages. May I know where have you built your house? If anywhere near hoppers crossing/tarneit, then trust me you're not alone. Apparently this area was badly hit by the storm and rain caused lots of flash flooding too. Our insurance company advised us they will contact us in next couple of days as they are inundated with such cases. Your builder probably didn't bother for inspection 'coz your house has passed the 3 months builders warranty period and your structure (wooden frame and tiles are still intact - just like mine) however by the looks of those photos, the tiles certainly seem to be an issue.Meanwhile try to proactively pull out as much damp insulation as you can to prevent any further damage to other rooms. luckily it was dry yesterday and today so that should have helped somehow. I will keep you posted regarding our meeting with the builder tomorrow. Until then stay safe! Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 19Feb 08, 2011 7:56 am Denny, we had the guy from the builder this morning for the inspection. He too was taken aback by the severity of damage. He went up into the attic to find the cause.He found watermarks on the plastering and one wet insulation batt. Still no cause identified at this stage. As we don't have any solar panels or air conditioning unit there is no possibility of internal leakage. They are going to send the plastering guy for the quote but wasn't sure who will pay for it (builder or insurance). I guess we're going to have to wait for the assessment from insurance company now. BTW one thing he mentioned (which could be applicable to your case as well)is due to the heavy rains and wind on Friday, the water "may" have been forced into the gap between the tiles, instead of sliding over them. Will let you know tonight for any further updates. Did you have your assessment done from the insurance company? Re: PD home - What happened on 14 months old house. 20Feb 08, 2011 8:24 am Hi Runmelb, I call insurance company everyday, still in the waiting list for assessor to come as they are very busy attending other claims, However, they asked me to get couple of quotes for the fixing to speed up the process. I also ask independent building consultant to come today for inspection. Builder not helpful at all. they always want to get away with thousand excuses. I told them the surrounding neighbors house were fine. the reply I got: It must be the wind blowing in certain angle that only hitting my house. Yes, you're right my house is located in the area you mentioned earlier. This certainly doesn't look good. I would be engaging with an independent inspector to have a look at this. As for the unscheduled site visits, most builders are quite… 1 28326 Old Home Restoration / Renovation Hi, just discovered all these junks left behind under the floor. Could any of these be asbestos? Best to leave as it is or clean up? Thank you for your thoughts 0 8070 Is it possible to render an old corrugated iron shed.I have heard that it can be done if it is covered with chicken wire first.Not sure of the ratio of the render mix and… 0 4898 |