Certificate for raft foundation on house

coup1917

Hopefully somebody might be able to advise me on this..?

Back in boom times, houses were thrown up and paperwork was not exactly a priority. My question is this: how common would it have been for an engineer to provide a cert for a foundation when he wasnt present for the actual pouring of the raft..?

Im concerned about purchasing a property where the cert has stated the above.. Would i have trouble selling in the future with the same details on a cert..? The house is 6 years old approx so im thinking any subsidence would have shown up by now..:(

Victor

Moved from Accommodation & Property.

Poor Uncle Tom

coup1917 wrote: »

....how common would it have been for an engineer to provide a cert for a foundation when he wasnt present for the actual pouring of the raft..?

Not common at all I would have thought. It can't be considered a certificate if the works were not witnessed, I mean what if the required reinforcement was not put in before the pour? is the engineer responsible if he has stated he wasn't present for the pour? It's not worth the paper it's written on, imo.

coup1917 wrote: »

Im concerned about purchasing a property where the cert has stated the above.. Would i have trouble selling in the future with the same details on a cert..? The house is 6 years old approx so im thinking any subsidence would have shown up by now..:(

Subsidence is only one factor to watch out for. What about failure due to inappropriate reinforcement? wrongly placed, badly tied or missing re-bars? what about inadequate cover for the reinforcement? what about consistency of fill of finished concrete? what about continuation of pour? strength of concrete? size of agregates?

Some of these could be answered by testing, but the question is will a person be willing to pay premium price for a property without full certification, my guess is no. If I was acting for a buyer I would not advise it.

gman2k

coup1917 wrote: »

how common would it have been for an engineer to provide a cert for a foundation when he wasnt present for the actual pouring .....

In my experience it's very common.And not just for small 'one-off' projects either.
I know of engineers who would ring up the builder to find out how things are getting on - on the day of the pour, or engineers who would 'know' the builder and trust his judgement and certify anyway.
I know of one engineer in my locality in particular who was certifying a property. The engineer said he inspected the foundation pour after the event, but the client knew that he had not been on the property due to a particular way the property was accessed and secured. The client was not overly concerned about this, as he knew and trusted the builder himself!!!!! (Oh the Irishness of the whole situation)

mickdw

gman2k wrote: »

In my experience it's very common.And not just for small 'one-off' projects either.
I know of engineers who would ring up the builder to find out how things are getting on - on the day of the pour, or engineers who would 'know' the builder and trust his judgement and certify anyway.
I know of one engineer in my locality in particular who was certifying a property. The engineer said he inspected the foundation pour after the event, but the client knew that he had not been on the property due to a particular way the property was accessed and secured. The client was not overly concerned about this, as he knew and trusted the builder himself!!!!! (Oh the Irishness of the whole situation)

There is a big difference with your example compared to the OPs question where the cert states that they have not seen anything.
At least in your example, if the engineer has issued a clean cert, it would fall squarely on his shoulders should it later be found that the raft was unfit fo purpose.
In the OPs case, I think the buyer will be taking on all risks personally with zero comeback should the raft fail

sinnerboy

I would offer a different take here. Properties are bought and sold all the time without complete certification. Historic properties would be an obvious example.

Now one day the housing market will be restored in Ireland. A huge proportion of houses exist with even less certification than in the case of the OP. They will be bought and sold.

So if the house is good for you for many other reasons try this

- seeking house and contents ( or maybe asking to vendor to ask technically only the can ) with this caveat-ed certificate fully disclosed.
- explore the possibility of hiring and engineer and a digger to open up trial holes and reissue a cert reflecting that.

But if the house is just a maybe - then keep looking. If you find you run into the same issue over and over - then re read this post

coup1917

mickdw wrote: »

There is a big difference with your example compared to the OPs question where the cert states that they have not seen anything.
At least in your example, if the engineer has issued a clean cert, it would fall squarely on his shoulders should it later be found that the raft was unfit fo purpose.
In the OPs case, I think the buyer will be taking on all risks personally with zero comeback should the raft fail

Good point...
I should have clarified, the engineer states he was present for the reinforced steel works and then for inspecting the completed raft.
He has then stated he was not present for the raft pouring and that this is the responsibility of the builder developer.

After 7 years im confident of the structure of this raft at this stage, but i have learned this engineer is up to his eyes at the moment for signing off something that went wrong. I dont want to divulge too much but my main worry is that i could be tarnished with a dodgy engineer even if i were to sell on a perfect house in the future.

ITBhoy

Hi Guys

Looking for some help , I am looking at a house buy, its build date is June 2001 , my engineer surveyed and said all is good but get the foundation cert , I've been told there were none provided when the houses were built , my mate who lives in the same estate has validated this , the only certs available is a Certificate of Compliance with Planning Permission/Building Regulations and Certificate of Identity, am I right in thinking that Foundation certs only came into the mix in latter years ?

landcrzr

Regardless of what the Engineers has written on his cert, you can be assured he/she was not onsite to witness the construction throughout the build. On a typical one off house, an Engineer will usually only visit a few times, most likely to certify stage payments to the builder unless the client has specifically paid him/her to attend more frequently.
The cert is just a piece of paper and I'm sure the Engineer in question had professional indemnity insurance at the time but in the past 6 years many Engineers have fallen by the wayside and may not have maintained the required 6 or 12 years of PI that they are required to, to maintain cover on projects they've completed in the past. Aside from all that, most Engineers PI does not cover either the first €35 or €50k of a claim.

So what am I saying?
If you have a doubt, get the house checked by a competent Engineer or insist that the Vendor does and gives you the report.

mickdw

landcrzr wrote: »

Regardless of what the Engineers has written on his cert, you can be assured he/she was not onsite to witness the construction throughout the build. On a typical one off house, an Engineer will usually only visit a few times, most likely to certify stage payments to the builder unless the client has specifically paid him/her to attend more frequently.
The cert is just a piece of paper and I'm sure the Engineer in question had professional indemnity insurance at the time but in the past 6 years many Engineers have fallen by the wayside and may not have maintained the required 6 or 12 years of PI that they are required to, to maintain cover on projects they've completed in the past. Aside from all that, most Engineers PI does not cover either the first €35 or €50k of a claim.

So what am I saying?
If you have a doubt, get the house checked by a competent Engineer or insist that the Vendor does and gives you the report.

It would be poor PI cover thslat would have an excess of 35k.
Some good points re cover not being maintained. It's certainly widespread with large numbers leaving the country.
Is blame the system. Cover should be obtained more as a bond that would be paid up front and valid for 6 years. The idea of trusting engineers to keep cover in place is crazy.

landcrzr

mickdw wrote: »

It would be poor PI cover thslat would have an excess of 35k.
Some good points re cover not being maintained. It's certainly widespread with large numbers leaving the country.
Is blame the system. Cover should be obtained more as a bond that would be paid up front and valid for 6 years. The idea of trusting engineers to keep cover in place is crazy.

An excess of €35k may be poor but not uncommon at all when you consider it lowers the Engineers premium.