[Scott3229]

Im looking into purchasing a home, but it has some sagging floor joist.
Its a foreclosure home so its sold as is no disclosures, so I was curious if anyone here has experience with jacking up floor joist with ellis jacks or screw jacks or if there are any other methods.

Does anyone know how much it would cost roughly?
It is a single story approximatly 1200 sq ft with a dirt floor crawl

 

[Daniel Holzman]

If you are looking for a useful opinion as to options and costs, you will need to supply a lot more information. Inquiring minds would likely want to know:

1. Size, spacing and span of the floor joists
2. How many inches are they sagging and where
3. How are the floor joists currently supported
4. How much working room is there underneath the floor joists

You would of course have to make measurements for this information. Making accurate measurements of the sag of a floor joist is not as simple as it sounds. I usually use a fluid level, accurate to about 1/8 inch, to measure deflection inside a house. However, bear in mind that measuring deflection of a floor is not the same as measuring deflection of the joist. To measure the joist, you can use a laser level along the bottom of each joist, then measure the deflection of the bottom of the joist along the laser line.

All of this may be difficult in a foreclosure, especially if the bank refuses to allow you to have unrestricted access to the underside of the house.

 

[Scott3229]

If you are looking for a useful opinion as to options and costs, you will need to supply a lot more information. Inquiring minds would likely want to know:

1. Size, spacing and span of the floor joists
2. How many inches are they sagging and where
3. How are the floor joists currently supported
4. How much working room is there underneath the floor joists

You would of course have to make measurements for this information. Making accurate measurements of the sag of a floor joist is not as simple as it sounds. I usually use a fluid level, accurate to about 1/8 inch, to measure deflection inside a house. However, bear in mind that measuring deflection of a floor is not the same as measuring deflection of the joist. To measure the joist, you can use a laser level along the bottom of each joist, then measure the deflection of the bottom of the joist along the laser line.

All of this may be difficult in a foreclosure, especially if the bank refuses to allow you to have unrestricted access to the underside of the house.

Yeah thats exactly it, I am dealing with people who don't want to lose their house so they are being very uncooperative so unfortunately i cant get in the crawl space at this point. Oh well, I suppose upon inspection I can get a better idea

 

[James Con]

I would say your morgage lender would insist on a third party inspection, If I were you I would have the deal pending till the house was inspected and an estimate for the repairs was drawn up (Bargaining Chip), then you would be able to see if the house was worth the money and the time to invest in. For the most part anything can be fixed if your handy but if the repairs are gonna cost tens of thousands to fix, it might not be worth it. Get a good inspector, one who knows his shnit.

 

[Mop in Hand]

The cost of jacking up floor joists may not be your biggest problem. I would be more concerned as to why they are sagging. Joists not sized properly? Posts sinking do to much water under the house or the foundation was built on fill? Foundation problems elsewhere? Beams wrongly sized or improperly placed? Broken joists or beams? If your lucky a 20 ton bottle jack and some shims will solve the problem. Take a good look before you leap.

 

[Scott3229]

I have scheduled an inspection from a licensed inspector, and thanks for the comments, I will look into this further tomorrow during the inspection and see whats actually causing the sagging thanks!