3 minute read
RENOVATING LEAKY HOMES
Leaky Home. Two words that will send a shiver up the spine of any homeowner.
It has been a blight on the New Zealand housing market for almost two decades and still affects the buying and selling of houses to this very day. So how did we end up in this situation? And is a leaky home the financial death sentence many believe it to be? There was a whirlwind of circumstances that culminated into the nationwide leaky home dilemma.
The leaky home crisis is an issue that relates to a high number of homes constructed between 1994 and 2004. These timber-framed buildings share a common issue revolving around a fault in their weather tightness. This resulted in a range of serious issues for the building and homeowners. One of the most prevalent issues is the timber framing decaying, and in extreme situations resulted in the building itself becoming structurally unsound and therefore unsafe to reside in.
Leaky homes also were prone to mould and spores developing around the damp timber framing, further imposing health risks on their occupants. By 2009, the repairs and replacement costs were estimated to be over $11 billion and have continued to grow in the 11 years proceeding. A major contributing factor to the leaky home crisis was the 1991 Building Act. This came into law in 1993 and ultimately changed a prescriptive system into one that is more of a selfregulated regime. This resulted in a handing over of responsibilities to the private sector to hand out building consents. This system was taken advantage of, resulting in a cash grab to hand out these consents without the adequate documentation, failing to conduct building inspections during construction, and handing out compliance certificates for buildings that should never have been granted one in the first place. But is it all gloom and doom for the owner of a home that has been deemed a leaky home? While it is by no means ideal needing to reclad your home, there can be positives if it needs to be done.
With crisis often comes opportunity
Many property experts will claim that curbside appeal can increase your property value by up to 25 percent and recladding your home can be an opportunity to modernise it.
It offers you a blank canvas to create a home that is distinctive to your taste and an opportunity to breathe new life into a home that has great bones. Recladding opens up your home to additional renovations and is often used as an opportunity for home extensions, as the recladding process requires going down to the framework of the home, to begin with. As many New Zealand homes were built without the modern design foresight contemporary homes have, an opportunity to increase the floor space in your home is a welcomed renovation for most.
So if you are in the situation in which you need to repair a leaky home, take a breath and see if there is an opportunity in it.
If the renovations are implemented smartly and by a knowledgeable team, you may have the chance to improve and modernise your home. It can be a chance to use recladding to create a statement home, one that fits the vision of your perfect abode.
AWARD COATINGS LTD
OVER THE TOP COATING SYSTEMS
Exterior Cladding | Exterior Plastering | Painting & Decorating
Your Dunedin home deserves a flawless finish. Award Coatings can provide it for you.
From multi-million-dollar new builds through to existing homes in need of modernising, our cladding company delivers superior results. Award Coatings offers professional installation of exterior wall cladding using high-quality Loxo cladding systems and flawless exterior plastering and painting.
