A freeholder contacted SERL following the construction of a ground floor rear extension of a flat in Hampstead, North London which lacked the landlord’s consent.
The landlord wanted reassurance from a qualified Structural Engineer’s inspection and report that their property in North London remained safe after the ground floor extension had been built. Our specialist service was also requested to assess some potential structural damage to the first floor flat which might have occurred as a result of the building work.
SERL was contacted by the landlord who was seeking a reputable, independent, and highly experienced structural engineering firm specialising in Structural Engineers Reports for residential properties in Hampstead and the North London area.
In response to the client’s requirements our qualified Chartered Structural Engineer recommended a Specific Structural Inspection report.
SERL offers two types of structural reports:
1) A localised, specific, and limited Specific Structural Inspection (SSI) report or a Structural Engineers Defect Report.
2) A broader General Structural Inspection Report (GSI) or Structural Engineers General Movement Report which focuses only on matters of cracking and movement.
We provided a bespoke Structural Engineers Report for the property in Hampstead, which was a variation on our GSI report, as while concentrating on one area at the rear of the property, we also inspected the structural condition of the first floor London flat.
The mid-terrace period property in Hampstead had long been converted into two separate ground and first floor flats.
A single-storey rear extension with a side return had been built some five years earlier and, while Town Planning permission and Building Regulations approval had been obtained, the ground floor lessee had not obtained the landlord’s consent.
In recent times, the landlord had noted cracking to the first floor flat and was concerned that this may have occurred either during the building work or due to a lack of support following the removal of various walls to facilitate the ground floor rear extension.
We found the property in North London to be commensurate with age showing the normal signs of historic settlement, which were long standing and separate from the current issue.
The first floor flat decoration was extremely dated with a range of normal plaster cracks due to old lath and plaster and very aged decoration. There were all manner of shrinkage cracks and normal vertical gaps between the abutting walls, and cracks between wall and ceilings, which were entirely normal.
There were no signs of any deflection-related cracking and, most importantly, no sign of any structural distress in any of the loadbearing walls above.
All of the damage was confined to the non-loadbearing partitions and, as mentioned previously, to the dated lath and plaster which had not been decorated for decades.
We were able to reassure the landlord that their Hampstead property remained safe. We pointed out that all the cracks were normal plaster cracks. These may or may not have occurred during the building works in the flat below as, no matter how careful a builder is, there is always some physical vibration, and it is usual to expect minor cracking in such walls during building work.
The learning points include remembering that, leaseholders are obliged to notify their landlord when undertaking any material building work and the landlords consent is always required for extensions. This includes when those undertaking the works partly own the freehold of the property, as this is completely separate from the leasehold interest.
While in theory the Party Wall etc. Act 1996 does not apply when undertaking works to the ground floor in terms of its relationship with the first floor, it is always prudent to have a schedule of condition to record the state of the decoration before and after the building work. This protects both parties, and the builder, and allows a fair conclusion to any damage caused.