My new beautiful house is falling apart!!!

DonnaS

I have a new house that is barely a year old. We have a huge crack on both sides of the doorway to our dining room. That crack is almost 2 ft in length and the top part is moving to the right. We showed this to the builder when he came in to fix our cracked tiles and he replied that he has never seen anything like it. He did not make me feel better. To make things worse, the wooden floors are sinking. In some areas it is as much as over 1/4 inch. I was beginning to worry, so I took a look under my house. I saw that my two story house with lots of tiles, stone work in the masterbath, and heavy cement counter tops in the kitchen is being supported by 4x4 without reenforcements! IS THIS NORMAL????? I live in the Pacific Northwest, we have earthquakes here. The 4x4 is just resting on the cement lines with no bolts anywhere. The center of my 2,150 ft house is sinking! WHAT AM I TO DO??? When you pay big $$$$ for a house you don't expect it to mess up this bad. I am scared that this house will fall down. Everyday I see more cracks and more sinking. I am going crazy!!! Please help, I am getting the run around by everyone including the builder!

Mike Swearingen

Wasn't this home inspected and approved by your local Building Inspector prior to your purchase?
Hire a third party licensed General Contractor or engineer to thoroughly inspect the structural integrity of this house.
If they find building code violations and defects, report them to your Building Inspection Department and your state contractor licensing board, and then hire an attorney.
Good Luck!
Mike

mighty anvil

If the wood post is the only thing supporting the center of the house, a wood 4x4 doesn't sound like it is the right material or sized properly. It should be secured top and bottom and would have to be pressure treated if in contact with concrete and should be steel to avoid movement problems over time, You need a written report from a structural engineer and be sure to have him include all of the framing that is accessible. Good luck with it.

DonnaS

Thank you for your helpful comments. I went down to city hall yesterday and requested the plans to my house and the documents that are along with it. (They were MUCH more helpful this time.) When they pull it out, then I will have a meeting with the engineer and the inspector to go over the plans. I took some video footage of my house and by then I will have a ditigal camera to have still pictures. I hope to be able to post those pictures here so it will be clearer what I am talking about. After I find out what is exactly wrong with my house according to the codes in Washington, then I will be contacting a lawyer in Seattle to handle it. Thank you again... This has been very stressful!

Krichton

I can honestly say I have no idea what the problem is going by your description. Please post pictures. For the record though new construction is often not very good and are certainly not up to code alot of times. You have to be very careful buying a new house these days. There aren't enough inspectors to inspect every house being built.

Alyssa

That really truly stinks to move into a new house and have such problems. We had a home inspection and luckily everything was good but they couldn't test the sprinkler system... well of course it was busted and now its going to cost us a thousand dollars or so by the time they find the problem and wreck the lawn.

Good luck figuring out whats wrong and getting it fixed.

Glasshousebltr

Dona, sounds to me like some one poured their footing on fresh fill, did a little tamping and thought that would do her.

You said 4x4s, I'm assuming your over a crawl and it's the center girder being supported. Take your pics, then get a professional contractor to re lift before it does any more damage. You might not come out good in the end and you should at least try to limit the damage.

It would be a good thing to get the pro to check all your load points as well. They may have done it more than once.

Bob

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