Concrete floor major problem!

[Maxon]

Hi,

I am looking at buying a house and this house has a 24x30 garage that has been drywalled and its a nice garage but the dumb@#$ who built it poured the floor without using any rerod or metal mesh, and they cut the floor into sections and it looks like the cuts are way to deep, now on the far south corner of the floor their is a 1 1/2" crack and it looks like that section of the floor is moving south, there is also evidence of this on the drywall in the middle of the inside back wall.

My question is can this be fixed, can I build some kind of a support on the outside of the garage to stop this from sliding?


Thanks

 

[Professur]

If there's no reinforcement, it's probably not to code. Whether or not it's fixable might well be the least of your worries.

 

[Maxon]

The info i got was from the neibor, I know that it dosent look too good..

I would really like to have this house but if the garage is gonna fall over mby its not worth it. Cause you know thats the best part...

 

[Professur]

Yeppers. You need to take a walk to city hall and get a gander at the construction permits issued for that property, and the inspector's sign offs. I don't know about where you are, but here, any work like that must be inspected by the city and signed off.

 

[twostory]

Yes, it can always be fixed, but usually the cost is so high, no one fixes it.

My advice, figure out the cost to (remove & replace) the entire floor & the footings for the walls. Then lower your offer on the house by this much. Also put in you offer that you have priced out the repair needed and that is why your offer is way below the asking price.

If the seller says "no way", then walk. Do not pay top dollar for a house with a know problem, then suffer with the bad floor forever.

 

[GarageEnvy]

A couple of issues come to mind
1) How old is the house and in what part of the country? My home was built in 1955 in California and like most all homes of the area there was no form of mesh or rebar in the slab.
2) Definitely check with the city on permits. I'd do this regardless of the concrete issue. Don't just look for a permit being pulled, look for inspections that were signed off.
3) Until my plans changed with my new garage I was going to tie into an existing footing. Basically they could drill and epoxy in rod and then replace the slab area. This is big bucks!
4) If it has moved, it moved for a reason. Look for drainage and subsidence issues. If the crack is 1.5" long that may not be that bad. If it's 1.5" wide well something is going on. You've already noticed signs of movement in the drywall. I work as an appraiser and I've seen some real horror stories.
5) A home inspection for sure but consider an inspection by a contractor or structural engineer as well.

 

[Maxon]

The house is in Iowa and the garage was built in 05,(the house in 1994) thats from the accessors webpage,

And it is 1.5" wide and the lenght of that section.

From what I saw they seem to have cut thru the whole thing when they cut it.

I will try to get a pic or two today, the seller bought this at an auction and he said he didnt know about it.

 

[Maxon]

whoops,, the house was built in 1944 and is about 20' away from the garage.

 

[Maxon]

here is a link to a pic of the back of the garage floor you can see the crack.. http://img219.imageshack.us/img219/5723/garage1x.jpg

 

[Maxon]

I went over there at lunch and took some pics of the crack and here it is..

http://img697.imageshack.us/img697/8628/garage2k.jpg

http://img62.imageshack.us/img62/655/getattachment222.jpg

and here is one of the outside corner of that side.

http://img638.imageshack.us/img638/9955/getattachment111.jpg

 

[Maxon]

The dumb@%% that did this cut clear thru the concrete to the ground and it looks like they stopped when the got to the outer edge.

 

[GarageEnvy]

I live in California so I don't have any experience with frost heave but I suspect that is what has happened. Bottom line is something caused that to move and without addressing the cause it will probably continue to move. For me, unless this property was the end all be all of homes and was uniquely perfect for what you want in every other respect I'd probably walk away. To get a pro to come in and turn-key solve that deal I could easily see testing, engineer reports, design work, a big mess and a 10k+ bill attached to it. Again though that's my California background speaking.

 

[arroberts]

It looks like that corner is washing away. To me it looks like the bottom of the pour is visible in the 111.jpg picture. It might be possible for one of the concrete lifting outfits to fix it and then you would need to reinforce and regrade the land around the garage, maybe a retaining wall?

 

[texas-saluki]

I would call a foundation repair guy to come out and take a look. they can determine if it can be fixed and if so how much. If it is not fixable or reasonable then make an offer based upon it's replacement or if it is fixable make an offer based upon the repair.

It seems like this would be similar to failing inspection and having to fix a roof, doors, etc before you can get a loan closed.

Good luck

 

[KustomZ]

Same problem I have with mine. I just moved the building off of the slab and I'm waiting on the concrete crew to replace the slab.

 

[ddawg16]

Have you confirmed that the garage was built with permits?

If no permits....walk away from it......

The garage is only 5 years old and is already looking like that? What do you think it would like ine 10 years?

 

[70redbee]

I think you have many more problems than just a crack. There are structural issues for that to crack on the outside like you have. Assess the price without the garage and deduct that from your offer or just walk away. This is going to be a very expensive repair no matter how it is done. I have seen many cracks in concrete but this is one of the worst I have seen. BUYER BEWARE!

 

[djjsr]

Looks like there may not be any footings under the slab. A little digging at an outside edge could confirm.

 

[WNYflyer]

Yep,

I suspect the foundation for that garage is just a slab with no wall footing at the perimeter. When you say they cut the joint full depth I really suspect you maybe seeing a joint caused by pouring the sections of slabs at different times.

That slab with no reinforcing and especially all those joints is not getting you a slab that can act as the foundation for your structure. Yes you may have some settlement issues but that is one of the reasons the slab should have no joints or joints that are tied together with reinforcing.

As you said they didn't know what they were doing and you are seeing the results.

 

[Identaltech]

I would say you have a floating slab.
This is done all the time here in Iowa.
but you must have reinforcement and a thicken edge.
The way this one was done every year your problems will get worse.
the frost heave will contiue to tear this apart.
the only fix I would except would be to jack up the garage and pour a new slab.
but do it the right way this time.

 

[Yardgoat]

My house is 40 yr old,and have a 1/8 in crack in the carport that i filled with a caulk for concrete in a corner. I agree 100% its floating,now where i dont know.I like the idea of deducting the garage from house and start over......................YG......good luck