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Independent damp surveys in Barking and Dagenham

Barking and Dagenham is dominated by one thing: the Becontree estate, built in the twenties and thirties and the largest council built estate in the world. Around twenty six thousand homes to a small number of repeating designs. That uniformity is unusual and genuinely useful, because a fault found in one house is very often present in its neighbours.

Request a survey Fixed-price surveys from £215, report included

Barking and Dagenham housing, and what it does when it gets wet

The Becontree houses are cavity walled cottage estate homes with rendered or brick elevations, a functioning damp proof course and suspended timber ground floors over ventilated voids. A century on, they have been through right to buy, individual improvement and varying standards of maintenance, so the housing is uniform but its history is not. Ground level is the near universal issue: nine decades of paths, drives and patios laid over one another until the ground bridges the damp proof course.

The second recurring fault is ventilation. Underfloor airbricks blocked by patios, extensions and render, and windows replaced without trickle vents. Because so many of these houses have had the same improvements at similar times, the same defects turn up street after street, and a survey on one address will often correctly predict the next.

Barking town centre and the riverside add post-war and recent high density housing, with the airtight envelope and mechanical ventilation issues that come with newer construction, and the borough has a substantial private rented sector where disrepair reports need to distinguish building defects from occupation with measurements rather than opinion.

What we are usually called out to in Barking and Dagenham

  • Ninety years of layered paths and drives bridging the damp proof course on Becontree housing
  • Airbricks blocked by later patios, extensions and render
  • Windows replaced without trickle vents, removing the ventilation the house relied on
  • Timber decay at joist ends where an underfloor void has stopped being ventilated
  • Housing disrepair reports that separate building defects from occupation
  • Airtight recent flats with uncommissioned or disabled mechanical ventilation

Which kind of damp is it?

In a London building the same stain can have four or five different causes, and in Barking and Dagenham we regularly find two at once. Water rising from the ground through a wall with no working course. Rain entering through a parapet, a gutter, a cracked render or a window head. Moisture from the air condensing on a cold wall. Water from a pipe, a bath seal or a flat upstairs. Each needs a different repair and, in a shared building, often a different person to pay for it.

Our readings are taken to separate them: at depth as well as at the surface, at heights up the wall, on either side of the damp, and alongside humidity and surface temperatures. The pattern, not a single number, is what the diagnosis rests on.

What an ATi survey in Barking and Dagenham includes

  • Moisture readings taken on a grid and at height bands, so the report can show which way the water is moving
  • The outside of the building, including front areas, lightwells, parapets and rear additions where access allows
  • Communal elements that affect your flat: shared gutters, soil stacks, roof outlets and the party walls
  • Humidity, air and surface temperatures where mould or condensation is in question
  • Extract fans checked for where they discharge and how much air they move
  • Timbers within reach, and the sub floor where a hatch or a lifted board allows

The report

Written within 24 hours of the visit, and structured for the people who will act on it in Barking and Dagenham: you, your solicitor, a freeholder, a contractor.

  • A summary of the cause and urgency on the first page
  • Photographs and readings, located on the building
  • Who is likely responsible for each defect, where it sits outside your demise
  • Remedial recommendations as a specification for contractors to price
  • An indication of what that work should reasonably cost
  • What does not need doing, including any treatment already quoted

From request to report

  1. Send the request form or call. We reply the same day with the fee in writing.
  2. We agree a visit, including evenings and weekends, and arrange access to any communal areas if needed.
  3. The surveyor spends as long as the Barking and Dagenham property needs.
  4. The written report follows within 24 hours.

Most of our Barking and Dagenham surveys are for one of four people: a buyer whose survey flagged damp, a tenant or landlord with mould, a leaseholder trying to get a freeholder to act, or an owner holding a damp proofing quote. Each needs the same thing, an account of the cause from somebody with no interest in the remedy, and that is all we provide.

Leaseholders, landlords and buyers in Barking and Dagenham

Leaseholders in Barking and Dagenham often discover that the cause of their damp sits in a part of the building they do not own. Our report says where the water is coming from and which element of the building it passes through, which is the evidence a freeholder or managing agent needs under the lease. For landlords, damp and mould are hazards under the Housing Health and Safety Rating System, and social landlords in England now work to the fixed timescales of Awaab's Law. Our guide to Awaab's Law explains what that means.

By town

Becontree

One of the largest interwar council estates ever built, now largely in mixed ownership. Cottage style houses with cavity or solid walls, many altered with replacement windows, render and extensions. Mould and condensation, failed render and bridged courses at the base of walls are what we usually find.

Barking town centre

Victorian terraces near the station alongside large recent developments and tower blocks. The terraces need their yards and rear additions looked at; the newer flats need their ventilation working.

Dagenham and the riverside

Post war housing and new developments near the Thames on low ground. Floors on the lowest streets can be affected by groundwater, and newer flats see construction moisture and ventilation issues.

Where we cover

We survey across the borough, from Barking and the riverside out through Dagenham and the Becontree estate.

  • Barking
  • Dagenham
  • Becontree
  • Chadwell Heath
  • Rush Green
  • Marks Gate
  • Creekmouth
  • Castle Green
  • Goresbrook

Postcode districts

  • IG11
  • RM8
  • RM9
  • RM10

What customers say about us

Tom and Ben were brilliant from start to finish. Friendly, professional, and really knew their stuff. The report was clear, honest, and sent over quickly. Highly recommend ATI Damp Surveying!

Gary Emberson, on Google

We had this company at my parents house to survey. Professional and polite. Good communication and on time for appointment.

Jacqueline Stokes, on Google

Barking and Dagenham questions

Everyone in our street has the same damp. Is that a coincidence?

On Becontree, almost certainly not. Thousands of these houses were built to the same handful of designs at the same time, so they share their construction, their damp proof course height and their underfloor ventilation arrangement. When a whole street has had drives and paths laid over the decades in a similar way, the same bridging fault appears in each. That is useful: the diagnosis is often quick and the remedy is the same modest external work rather than anything applied to the inside of the wall.

Our floorboards feel soft and the ground floor smells musty. What is that?

It is most often the underfloor void having stopped being ventilated. These houses have suspended timber floors over a void that airbricks were meant to keep dry. Block those with a patio, an extension or render and the void becomes still and damp, the joist ends built into the wall stay wet, and decay follows. It is a serious finding because it is structural, and it is also usually cheap to arrest once identified.

Our Becontree house has rendered walls and damp inside. Is the render the problem?

It can be. Cracked or impermeable render holds water against the wall and stops it drying outwards. The survey checks the render closely and the pattern of damp inside.

Our flat in a new Barking development has mould. Who is responsible?

If ventilation is not working as designed or water is getting in at a detail, it may be a defect for the developer or managing agent. The report measures and records the cause.

Do you survey for tenants and landlords in Barking and Dagenham?

Yes. The report separates building defects from condensation, which helps landlords meet their duties and helps tenants show what needs fixing.

Will you try to sell me damp proofing in Barking and Dagenham?

No. We carry out no remedial work, so there is nothing to sell after the survey. The report states the cause, the work that would actually fix it and an outline of what that work should reasonably cost, so you can get like for like quotes from contractors of your choice, or put it to a seller, landlord or freeholder.

Nearby

Every area we cover

Book a damp survey in Barking and Dagenham

We survey and report only, with no treatment to sell, so what the report says is the whole of our interest. Same day response to every enquiry, and a written report with photographs within 24 hours of the visit.

Book a survey or call 020 3355 4944