Integrity House Inspections
  • Home
  • About
  • Contact
  • Work photos
  • Whats in my report?
  • Useful links and asbestos related articles
  • Blog

Asbestos

18/6/2019

0 Comments

 
Asbestos was used in many products manufactured for house building and renovations in Australia. Buying a house built prior to mid 1980's can be a major concern to the home buyer.
The flat building sheets, Hardiplank (as seen in the photo on the right), Villaboard (used in most bathrooms) and Hardiflex (used for the eave cladding around the outside of the house) were the most commonly used products and the asbestos was removed from these products in 1981. The same looking product was still produced without the asbestos, but using cellulose fibres, so dates are important to know what product your home is built with.
Compressed Sheeting often used in upper storey additions or balcony flooring contained asbestos up until 1984 as was fibre cement drain pipe and pressure pipe.
The Super 6 fence sheeting (as seen in the photo on the left) was still manufactured with asbestos up until 1985.
Shadowline wall cladding (used in a lot of shacks as external wall cladding) also was sold up until 1985 containing asbestos.
Asbestos is not a threat if the product is in sound condition, this must be noted, however the product can become brittle with age and easily damaged, releasing asbestos fibres into the air.
Cutting, breaking, drilling, sanding, grinding, pressure cleaning or scraping can release the asbestos fibres.
Asbestosis may become evident 5–15 years after continued exposure to high asbestos fibre concentrations.
Mesothelioma does not become evident for 15 - 20 years.
​Lung cancer is also related to Asbestos fibre inhalation, by its own or in conjunction with smoking within 10 - 40 years.
0 Comments

Things that I see that suggest this is not a good home to buy

12/6/2019

0 Comments

 
When looking at a home, certain things should give off a warning to a home buyer.
The first photo is of the gap between the pathway and the house, showing the pathway has moved 100mm away from the house. This is probably due to poor site preparation on reactive soil or a retainer wall not adequately supporting the soil around the house. As this house has been built on a strip footing, this is a problem.
The second photo is taken from the roof looking at the rear verandah that has had some very DIY roofing added. The roof sheeting is obviously not adequately supported or attached and is dangerous.
The roof restoration was so poorly done, that tile edges were not painted, sealant gaps not filled and cracked tiles just painted over. I would assume that they were not adequately cleaned either, so the roof paint is likely to blister and peel.
Newly replaced timbers in the under floor area and roof space can represent termite damaged timber has been replaced or in this case, the DIY effort was to assist in replacing broken timbers. The roof collar tie was not level, so definitely  DIY, the original ones may have been broken by some one in the ceiling space placing a load on it. The flooring timber beam shown has been inadequately strutted directly to the ground. This is making a bridge for termite attack directly to the flooring, so definitely a DIY effort. The support is just resting on a brick off cut, so not actually supporting anything. This is nothing a tradesman would do.
This house door frame have had the door re hung, but the hinges are poorly fitted and the striker plate missing from another door frame.This is a minor issue, but shows the amount of care given to the home renovation to sell.
The next photo is of the driveway sinking 120mm down from the carport concrete floor level. A  car could not drive over this step up. The cause is the failure of a retaining wall and subsequent sinking of the soil due to poor sub soil preparation for reactive soil. The soil has also been affected by storm water flow due to miss alignment of the storm water down pipe, allowing for water to enter the sub floor area and wash out the ground under the drive way causing the sinking.
This same house has leaking bathroom issues with drumming floor tiling caused by the movement of the sub floor area flexing the bathroom floors. Also salt damp issues as shown in the photos as well as minor cracking to the brick work mortar and weathering and fretting of the mortar between the bricks due to poor mortar mixing by the brick layer.
I can not show too many identifiable photos for legal reasons as this home is still on the market and the vendor will find a buyer eventually, so buyer beware.



0 Comments

    Author

    Steve McLeod 

    Archives

    October 2022
    August 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    March 2022
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    October 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    March 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    August 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    September 2017
    June 2017
    February 2017
    December 2016
    October 2016
    June 2016

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.

Posted by: Integrity House Inspections

Contact information: integrityhouseinspections@gmail.com.