Getting a damp survey?

[plsdontlookatme]

FTB, our prospective purchase has come back with elevated damp readings and apparently needs a bit of remedial work. Surveyor suggested getting the work costed by a PCA-approved damp specialist before proceeding. Any advice on this would be hugely appreciated

How old is the house?

Damp can be solved as simply as taking off modern new, sweaty gympsum plaster and putting back with lime plaster in older houses. Then give it time to dry out and paint with breathable earth based paint.

Ventalition, french drains, extractors, occasional use of dehumidifiers too.

Do not pump an old house with damp cure stuff. It never works and is left over advice from the 80s. That is if it's an older house.

Damp is nearly always solvable. But it depends on your patience, living choices (you can't have a airtight house) and appetite for some quite dusty disruption until you remove the new non breathable stuff and put it back to old. Again this is presuming it's an older house.

You need to check if this damp is coming from faulty guttering or if ground levels outside the house are too high - in which case you just dig a trench along the bottom of the wall

tell us where the damp is supposed to be with photos if possible.

@pigletjohn is the expert here.

How old is the house? Almost all surveys will come back with some sort of elevated damp readings.

If it's only on external walls I wouldn't bother with a survey as these things are usually rectified by fixing gutters/downpipes or lowering the ground externally (digging a channel and filling with gravel essentially)

If it's been found on internal walls or floors I'd be a bit more worried.

Source: bought a house with red warning for damp on homebuyers. All solved through the above methods without forking out for a survey.

Look on the Property Care Association website, get three quotes from independent damp and timber surveyors. Pick one with good credentials and good reviews.

Never ask a damp work company to survey - it needs to be someone independent.

Talk to them all about what they'd do, get their take on things before hiring.

Ok say you’ve got a survey/damp quote and it comes in at £2000. Now you go back to the agent and say this and you want £1000 off the price (you can ask for the full amount but it’s normal to split the cost as you are benefiting from the fix). Or that they sort it before you go exchange. They may well say no then you have to decide if you want to proceed. It’s a bit of risk/luck. I’ve had damp issues that turned out to be far more severe and I’ve had damp issues that were easily resolved at much less cost than original quote.

Flat is 100 years old - and thank you, because this is what I'm hoping (I'm a historic buildings nerd and a luften evangelist who opens the windows the second I wake up/get home)

Surveyor says it's likely water ingress around the windows - not sure if that's good or bad news in the world of fixing damp. Also looks like the freeholders could better maintain the gutters.

Flat is in a 100-year-old building, surveyor thought it might be a combination of badly-maintained gutters and poorly-fitted/defective windows. Glad to hear that you managed to sort it out!

Good to know that the convention is to go 50/50, thank you - and yes, surveyor's advice was to do the work ourselves as apparently the risk is that even if the seller agrees to do it themselves they get it done cheaply/drag their feet.

Do not allow anyone into the house who sells silicone injections.