ATi Damp SurveyIndependent damp surveys in Bromley
Bromley has larger houses on larger plots than most of London, which changes what goes wrong. Long roof runs, more rainwater goods, mature trees close to the building, and gardens that have been landscaped several times over. Very little of the damp we survey here starts at the wall it appears on.
Bromley housing, and what it does when it gets wet
The dominant stock is interwar and post-war detached and semi detached housing, cavity walled with a working damp proof course. That means the diagnosis nearly always turns on something external. A bay roof with a shallow fall, a hopper head that overflows in heavy rain, a shared valley gutter between two roof planes, or a chimney flashing that has lifted. Any of these puts water into the wall a long way from where the stain appears inside.
Landscaping is the other half of the picture. These plots have been re landscaped repeatedly, and each time the ground tends to go up. Raised beds against the house, block paving laid over an existing drive rather than instead of it, and decking built off the wall all bridge the damp proof course. On a sloping plot, the uphill elevation collects everything the garden sheds, and the effect is seasonal rather than constant, which is a useful diagnostic in itself.
The subsoil across much of the borough is chalk with clay above it, and mature trees are common. That combination matters for timber and for movement rather than for damp directly, but it means we look at drainage runs carefully. A drain displaced by root growth under a solid floor produces a persistent damp patch that responds to nothing done to the wall, and it is easy to spend a lot of money before anyone lifts the manhole cover.
What we are usually called out to in Bromley
- A damp patch on a bedroom wall traced to a lifted chimney flashing or an overflowing hopper head
- Raised patios, block paving and decking bridging the damp proof course on a house that never needed treating
- Seasonal damp on the uphill elevation of a sloping plot where garden drainage runs at the house
- Bay roofs with too shallow a fall, ponding and letting water in at the junction with the main wall
- Displaced or root damaged drains under solid ground floors producing persistent localised damp
- Timber decay in roof voids and bay roofs where a slow leak has run for years without showing inside
Where we cover
We survey across the borough and out to the Kent boundary.
- Bromley
- Beckenham
- Orpington
- Chislehurst
- Petts Wood
- West Wickham
- Hayes
- Shortlands
- Biggin Hill
Postcode districts
- BR1
- BR2
- BR3
- BR4
- BR5
- BR6
- BR7
Book a survey in Bromley
Same day response to every enquiry, and your written report within 24 hours of the visit. Put your postcode in the form and we will confirm cover and fee the same day.
Book a surveyOr call 020 3355 4944.
Bromley questions
The damp only appears in winter. What does that tell you?
Quite a lot. Damp that is genuinely seasonal usually points at something driven by weather or ground water rather than at a constant defect: driving rain on an exposed elevation, garden drainage running at the house on a sloping plot, or a gutter that only overflows above a certain rainfall. Constant damp, unchanged through the year, points somewhere else entirely, typically a plumbing leak or a drain. The pattern over time is evidence, so it is worth telling us when you first noticed it and what the weather was doing.
Do you need to come inside, or can it be diagnosed from outside?
Both, and the outside is usually where the answer is. We take calibrated readings internally to establish where the moisture is and how much of it there is, then work outside to find where it is entering: ground levels, drainage, rainwater goods, roof junctions, flashings and pointing. A survey that only looks at the inside face of the wall can tell you a wall is wet. It cannot tell you why, and why is the part you are paying for.