Huge cracks in walls

[LucyPowell77]

I'm looking for some advice on how to proceed with the situation I find myself in. There are cracks appearing all the wall and ceiling in my house. A few months ago I reported the cracks to my insurance company as possible subsidence. Based on the photos have sent to my insurance company they have ruled out subsidence. They have said the cracks are just cosmetic and to hire someone to repair the cracks myself. I really wish I could believe them, but the existing cracks keep getting bigger and new crack keep appearing. Today I put a tape measure in the biggest crack to see deep in went and it was 24 cm deep.
I can understand why the insurance say its not subsidence. There are no external cracks and most of the cracks are upstairs along the wall that joins to next doors. While it probably isn’t subsidence, I still think it is structural. Worst crack is now so wide that I can see that the bricks behind the plaster are also cracked.

I suspect the cracks are something to do with the renovation work my neighbours did a couple of years ago. My old neighbour died. He had not done any modernising to his home for a long time, so it probably needed a lot of work to bring it up to a modern standard. The new owners did a back to brick renovation along with putting a whole new roof on. The roofing work caused me a lot of issues at the time and I did raise my concerns with the roofer. The roofer did not like being questioned and became quite threatening towards me. Unfortunately, the roofer was a relation of the women who owns the house and that relationship turned sour too. I remember thinking at the time it was the strangest renovation I have ever seen. Other than the roofer no proper trades people worked on the house. The owner’s ‘contractor’ moved into house for about a year and did the rest of the work himself. I received no notice any work was going to done and no party wall agreement was issued. I am not a 100% sure if I should have received one or not. I don’t know if they should have issued one for the roof replacement. I suspect they may have removed an internal wall upstairs. The house used to be 3 bedrooms, but when it was rented out it was listed as 2 bedrooms. The cracks on walls are inline with what you would expect from a house suffering from roof spread. My house is a Victorian terrace and from what I understand they were only built to hold the weight of a traditional slate roof. I know my neighbours changed their roof from slate to something else, but I don’t know enough about roofing to identify what tiles they are. If the new tiles are heavier, they could have caused roof spread. I know they did not get any form of approval from the council for any of the work they had done. Also, I’ve noticed I seem to be able to hear a lot of what the tenants living next door are doing. I never heard the guy make a sound when he lived there.

So now I found myself in a situation where I have some very big very concerning cracks on my walls and ceiling, but my home insurance company are not interested at all. I suspect that it has something to do with work my neighbours have had done, but I’m not an expect so I could be wrong. I haven’t done any renovation or building work myself that could have caused structural issues. The situation is very stressful. The cracks on the ceiling in the smaller bedroom are now so bad that I am really concerned about how safe it is for my family to sleep in there. I feel out of my depth with this. My house feels unsafe, but it might be overreacting. The relationship with my neighbour is broken to the point we can’t have a friendly chat about this. If the issue is coming from her side than I would probably have to go down the legal route to recover costs. While I can’t ignore the damage I am scared of taking legal action against my neighbour. I fear there would be a backlash against me and things could get nasty. I need to establish for certain what’s causing the cracks. I thought my insurance company would at least send an accessor out to look at my house and tell me what the cause is, but they have refused to do that. A local surveyor has quoted me £1300 to assess my house and write a report for me. I can’t afford to spend that much, but I desperately need answers. Maybe I’m being suborn but I don’t think I should have to pay for a surveyor.

Has anyone else been in a similar situation? How did you get it resolved?

@PlmnkiIf you read the OP’s most recent post, the “surveyor” who came out thought it was differential movement between the offshoot and the rest of the house. No mention of party wall issues. That doesn’t mean the party wall issues should not be followed up.

“Which” are not surveyors or engineers. What is needed is an accurate diagnosis of this issue. Differential movement in Victorian buildings is often due to inadequate foundations. However there’s usually a reason why the foundations have become inadequate. The offshoot might also be less well constructed than the rest of the house with virtually no foundations. If there’s no cracking outside, it’s difficult for anyone on here to take a reasoned view. Plus there’s no info on soil and nearby trees.

What was the outcome op?

They rarely come back.

We had a structural engineer come out for £400 incl vat. He advised us to cut down the very large tree in our garden as he believes it is causing our single storey extension to pull away from the main house. He was very wary of going down the insurance route as the insurers tend to delay and observe cracks for years. You could pay your excess for minor repairs and then they hike your premiums and block subsidence cover in future.

Oh man, we had a structural engineer come yesterday for same issue, he said he's sure it's neighbours huge tree. But he came via our insurers and said they'll monitor for a year first to be certain it is tree (seasonal changes apparently). And get an arborist to look at tree etc

That’s exactly what he said they do. In the meantime your cracks could get worse. He said come winter the cracks will probably shrink as soil gets wetter and then the insurers will say it’s fine but of course after another summer you can have the same issue. Flippin climate change!!!
We have been advised to wait until winter when cracks reduce then repair with some technical stuff I can’t remember . With tree removed and repairs we should be sound although there is no guarantee of course.

SE said they wait a year to monitor if it reduces in winter and worsens in summer as this helps them evidence it being due to the tree. In meantime they are also going to check drains etc. We got our builder to pin it 2 years ago , before we realised it was subsidence, it opened up again a few months ago. We have to go down insurance route really, it's not our tree, so they will contact neighbour in due course. So stressful. Sorry to hijack thread OP.

And he said crack will worsen, but assured me extension won't fall down😣

What sort of pinning did the builder do? Underpinning shouldn’t cause crack to reopen

Not underpinning sorry, just crack stitching in the wall, metal bars across the crack. Back when we thought they were just settlement type cracks.

Have you tried speaking to your neighbours? Would they be open to felling the tree if you paid or split the cost?

The structural engineer is going to write his report then we wait for next steps. He said they would be digging trial pits etc as well so we're expecting a full investigation. Also mentioned cameras down drains. He said to leave conversations with neighbour to the insurers, as it could end up being a conversation with their own insurers etc, plus arborist etc will have to decide what plan is, I'm wondering if they have cracks too now

Yes and obviously tree roots don’t respect garden boundaries

Be very very careful about felling a tree. As a growing tree it will drink a lot of water. If it’s felled, all that water will be released into the soil. This can saturate the soil and cause further issues. Pollarding can be a better solution once a house has been stabilized.

Yes, that's why waiting on more reports, said if it does come down will be in stages. It's absolutely huge

But if the tree is sucking all the moisture and causing cracks, you want the soil to rehydrate do t you?

@landlordhell Not if it swells to such an extent that it pushes the walls out of alignment. It’s a delicate balance and not an exact science. Underpinning could help but tree roots are a long way from a tree and don’t forget about other houses nearby.

We have been advised to remove the large tree in our garden by a structural engineer.

Thank you that’s helpful. I had read about heave and put that to the engineer who said what you’ve said . Extension predates the tree which has shot up in recent years.

That's very useful info. I'm waiting on report but feel more informed now, thank you.

Staged reduction was old, now-debunked advice. You can't sneak up on soil rewetting. If you remove the tree in one go or over ten years, the soil will swell by the same amount. The speed at which this happens isn't a concern. The risk of structurally damaging heave occuring is as SubsidenceExpert states, in those specific circumstances.

Get a crack monitor, easy to install only about £10 each and you can track the movement, then see if insurance will pay for structural engineer to do report. Are there nearby trees or significant hedges? Cracks can widen during the summer with little rainfall and the ground shrinks especially clay

If you read the thread you’ll see this haslready been discussed.

Thank you.
And yes, insurance arranged the report

@NecklessMumster any update?