Hi all, I've recently seen a property on the market that may possibly have some termite damage but am not really sure.
The house is weather board and the lower 2 or 3 rows of boards in certain areas of the house have been eaten away pretty severly from the termites. The house next door, which is only 1 metre away, has no signs of any termite damage when looking at the weather boards. Inside the house there is no signs of cracking and the floor looks reasonably straight for an older weather board home.
If the problem is contained within just a few weatherboards then I think that is a fairly inexpesive problem to fix, however if stumps have also been eaten away then I assume this could be a costly problem. The house is up for auction so there is no way I can have the sale subject to a building inspection and I don't want to spend money on a building inspection on a house that somebody else might ultimately buy either.
Just wondering whether there is things I can check out at the next open for inspection that can give away any tell tale signs of severe termite damage. Is it possible that a termite population could have only eaten away at a few weather boards and moved along else where or do they just continually eat wood until there is no wood left to eat? Any advice is greatly appreciated.
If anyone has dealt with termites, or knows of other peoples horror termite stories i'd like to hear them aswell.
My Mum and Dad bought a house with termite damage. They had it professionally inspected, and had a builder quote on the repairs. Trouble was, no one realised the extent of the damage. Once they started pulling the gyprock off the walls, it became clear that the gyprock and the termite mud was pretty much all that was holding the second story up. They had to replace alot of the major structure of the house, including several large load bearing beams that were difficult and expensive to replace. And this was a house that was professionally inspected….. You simply can't tell for sure what is going on inside the walls unless you pull off the gyprock. I'd steer away from this house unless you can get it for land value less demotion costs. Mum and Dad ended up spending 80K more on their reno than was originally budgeted for. The vendor may choose to have a pest inspection done at their expense to show all prospective buyers. Still, I wouldn't trust it after what Mum and Dad have been through.
I think that can be fixed provided you like the property and it suits the budget
Gday skuz,
Termites are funny little critters. Ive ripped out walls before and discovered that the termites have eaten a few studs then left a few and continued eating out studs further along the wall, so even if you find damage in one area it wont necessarily be contained there.
What i usually do at inspections is give the walls a good thump with my fist every meter or so and listen for the termite mud falling inside the wall. If it sounds like theres mud falling then theres reason to suspect possible damage. With brick veneered houses though you'll sometimes hear the excess mortar falling off the noggings on external walls so this can be a little deceiving.
If you can get under the house with a torch check all the stumps for mud trails and check around the ant capping aswell for mud and rust. Also take a ladder to the next inspection and get up in the roof space for a good look around. I do this at every inspection-you might get a few looks from other prospective buyers and the agent would propably prefer you weren't so thorough but hey, it's your money you're about to spend not their's.
I'd also recommend getting a builder to quote on the damage but realise that he's only able to quote you on repairing the VISIBLE damage. There's really no way (apart from getting in imaging equipment but you'll have to pay for that) to know the full extent of the damage without pulling wall sheets off and floor boards up.
But with all that said, the way i look at it skuz, if the house looks and feels solid after you've had a good thorough look at it, it propably is. And if there are termites present get a treatment done and you'll have peace of mind knowing that any damage that they have caused isn't going to get any worse.
It's a bit hard with your situation because of the auction but next time use the termites to your advantage and negotiate a better deal. I did this with my last purchase and we knocked 17% off the asking price. I haven't had to spend a cent on it since.
Embrace the critters!
Good luckAre you sure that it is termite damage not dry rot?
Skuz
I just treated a place. If the termites have eaten the outside boards you can bet they have eaten more on the inside. They don't like light and therefore eat in the darker areas of the house more. You can indeed tell if there is activity behind the walls. But you will have to pay for it, funny that . Get a pest guy in with a moisture meature to go over the walls. Stumps may be eaten out on the inside up so you cant tell by the outside.Once they are in very hard to get them out, prevention is the best. Call Top Dog in Melbourne and no I dont work for them. I helped a friend with an inspection, I was more than impresed with them. They have a dog the same as at the airport to detect activity. For a few hundred bucks its better than a few thousand & it will be more like tens of thousands.
Get it inspected by a pro. and get over what you think the agent will think. Its an auction the person willing to pay the most on the day buys it, ants and all.
Skuz, there is plenty of good info on the net about these fascinating, yet problematic creatures. Look them up you will find it very interesting.
By the way when it comes to treating your own home yourself, dont. Get a pro that you can trust.
Cheers mate
T……………..I have just looked at a few pictures on Google and I would say that it is probably closer to termites I think. There were small cavities throughout the weather board. It looked like termites had dug tiny tunnels throughout the wood. Does dry rot look like this or does it have different characteristics.
Termite damage leaves the face of the timber intact (though paper thin). A good indication if there is more termite damage is checking floor spring – see if the floor bounces or remains solid when you jump up and down a little in several places, listen to the walls for scratching, look for mud trails on the visible piers, sources of water leaks etc.
Timber with dryrot can be spongy.
What about stumps that have been eaten out by termites? Are they also bouncy or do they remain strong? I'm not sure whether there are any tell tale signs by looking at the condition of the inside of the house, but this house seemed like it was in pretty good condition internally. No cracking in the walls and the floors seemed reasonably even for an older house.
I think with termites it is something that is worth spending a few hundred dollars and getting a pest inspector out. Arguably, buying a property with a termite problem could cost you tens of thousands of dollars. I just don't think it worth the risk trying to work out yourself what, if any damage has been done.
While the pest inspector is there, get a quote on repairing the damage (in a separate document). You may be able to use the inspection to push the price lower. Don't tell the vendor how much it will cost to have the property repaired; just tell them that there is damage and try to get the price much lower than it will cost to repair the damage. For example, if it will cost $10,000 to fix, don't tell the vendor this. Instead, just tell him that there is terrible termite damage and it will cost you a fortune to fix. Show him the report and offer $30,000 less.
Well, that's what I would do anyway.
Cheers
K
As a real estate agent I can tell you to stay well away from anything even suspected of termite damage. It will make resale incredibly hard. The mere mention of termites, even if treated will forever cruel the property. Its a stigma you don't need. It's becoming a buyers market anyway so why create a real estate headache when there are many great deals available all the time.
I have seen some properties fall down over pest inspections repeatedly and it is not fun at all. Steer clear unless you can hang on long enough to have the land value overtake the house price. In that instance you could buy cheap and live in it ( or rent out ) and then possibly demolish and start again on that block But again, why complicate matters when there are so many fish in the real estate sea.
Andrew Blachut
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