Do you have a 1930s house with lath and plaster ceilings?

[Booooooo]

Selling ours and buyer's survey is next week (home buyers). We have a crack in one of our ceilings which is longish. DH argues it's hairline and not and issue, I'm paranoid that it's going to show up in the survey as ceiling needing to be replaced.

If you have bought and had a survey done on a 1930s house recently, or any house with lath and plaster ceilings, were cracks such as this brought up?

[RoganJosh]

I only know our new house has lath and plaster ceilings because we’re doing work on it.
Are they a known problem area? I would expect little cracks in any house.

We didn’t have anything come up on the survey on them.

[helpfulperson]

Can you see the top side of your ceiling from in the attic? Whether it matters or not depends on whether it is 'blown' or not. Basically this means whether the plaster has started to come away from the 'lath'. You can also sometimes tell by by the sound it makes if you tap it.

Mine had a crack in it for about 20 years and it didn't cause a problem but for cosmetic reason (it was artex) I recently had it all plasterboarded over - cost about £400 for a one bedroom flat

Either way it may need some work but is not a major problem

[StatueInTheSky]

I have victorian lath and plaster

the sitting room ceiling has had a sinister bulge in it since we bought the house. They had painted it red, I painted it white, it is still there bulging.

If you are really worried you could plasterboard it and screw into the beams above....that is my plan, but in reality that's never going to happen.

[Booooooo]

We're not going to do anything about it as survey next week. Just wanted to know if it was something that was likely to get highlighted. Hoping not!

[CondimentQueen]

We bought a three-bed thirties house that was a wreck. The bedrooms are all in a row and the middle bedroom’s ceiling had collapsed so was obviously on the survey. The other two weren’t mentioned (despite cracks) but we pulled them down and re-did all three ceilings for peace of mind.

[DryHeave]

Bought a 30s house last year. Crack in lath and plaster ceiling noted on survey. We just had it over boarded and plastered once we moved in. No big deal.

[Booooooo]

@DryHeave was it a big crack? Did you ask for money off your sale price?

[DryHeave]

Yep, fairly big crack but only a small
Room. Money off? Nah. Only a couple of hundred quid to fix.

[SpareBedroom]

We have l & p ceilings in our 1930s semi.

We have lots of hairline cracks, mainly coming from the corners of rooms, or from the points where chimney breasts have been removed. They’ve been there since we moved in 20 years ago and nothing has fallen in so far! None were mentioned on the survey we had done when we moved in. I think they’re just caused by slight movement in the house/heating and cooling etc.

Occasionally I fill and paint over them. Some have stayed filled. Some have opened back up again. I did worry about them once upon a time, but not any more.

The kitchen and bathroom have both had new plasterboard ceilings now, but for a long time we lived with a massive sag in the kitchen ceiling where the water cylinder above leaked. Even that seemed quite stable!

[feejee]

the house we have an offer on and survey done on has some quite big cracks in the lathe and plaster ceiling, took a builder round who reckons just replace the ceilings in 3 rooms, its a 2 week job and we took the price of it off our offer. He said it wasnt a major issue

[Booooooo]

How much did you take off your offer @feejee? We have just one hairline (as DH would describe it) crack. It's not changed for years but it's making me paranoid now

[Ewanwhosearmy]

The l&p ceiling in our kitchen fell down recently, making a lot of mess. The dining room ceiling was bulging in places so we had men in to fix and board both. Cost £1300.

We bought this house 7 years ago and had a full survey. Nobody mentioned l&p ceilings. Since ours fell down loads of people have told us the same happened to them.

[JoJoSM2]

Even if it comes up, I don’t think it’s a big deal. Our last house was a 5-bed and all the ceilings and walls needed redoing (they were lath and plaster). It cost a few k but didn’t take more than a couple of weeks. I think feejee’s builder says 2 weeks for 3 ceilings to cover his back - he’ll probably juggle several jobs and won’t spend that much time on site.

[wowfudge]

It's an older house. I would think a purchaser was taking the mick wanting money off for a minor crack.