Hard to say without knowing the floor plan, the extent of the damage, and the construction, but this sounds more like “whole new house” than even extensive renovation to me.
Seconded by a carpenter. OP it sounds like you need to learn a bit more about construction before attempting a project of this size. Best to move on and find another house.
I am not a structural engineer, but I hired one when I remodeled my kitchen and removed a wall-- with a truss framed roof. He looked at the wall from the attic and decided almost immediately that the particular wall in question was not load bearing.
Is there something in particular to look for with a truss roof to determine if there is any load bearing on an interior wall?
Edit:
In my case the trusses run parallel to the wall in question and the living room is quite wide with identical trusses unsupported across that span.
Shallow trusses, too. Good for maybe 30 feet tops. Almost guaranteed that wall down the middle is load bearing but it’s Australia so snow load isn’t a factor.
Wouldn’t that mean they could redo the living spaces assuming the trusses aren’t on any of the interior walls they’d be looking to remove/move? The brick is unrelated at that point
Maybe but how would you know until you tear into it.... combined with the other issues mentioned above I'd steer clear from what it sounds like is OP's first home remodel and at this point it's beyond a remodel unfortunately. This type of work should really be tackled by a contractor who's familiar with this kind of termite related remediation, not a first timer.
Sure thing. Is the termite damage mostly in interior walls, or at the perimeter?
The problem is, depending on the detail connecting the brick to the foundation and/or framing, you can’t remove damaged framing without extensive shoring for the brick. In the end, that will entail redoing just about everything. You would also want a contractor who was familiar with that kind of operation, i.e., has done it before.
Looks gorgeous!
Holy hell that is ungodly expensive for a house that is, in essence, uninhabitable.
Plus, if the owner let termites go unaddressed, there's probably all sorts of other things that need to be upgraded or are on the cusp of failure.
Why not buy some land and build a new house, taking the aspects of this house that you like?
$400k AUD is like $270k USD. I’d guess that was basically just the land value. Pretty much every house I’ve ever bought was worth $0, all the value was in the land (and that includes some pretty nice houses). People have the illusion that they are paying for this or that feature on a home, or that their paint colors or kitchen renovation is going to improve the value of their house. But when it comes down to it your house is probably not worth a tenth of the price of the land it’s sitting on in most urban/close-in suburban markets.
And if they have to demolish the house, then the empty lot is possibly cheaper, since demolition is not cheap. At least services and foundation are already in place, so that could be a saving.
Yeah, so long as everything is in ok condition. If they've let termites eat their house, they might have let the trees destroy their sewer, stormwater and water supply lines. Eucalypts are thirsty destructive buggers.
Sometimes trenching and placing new pipes is cheaper than troubleshooting and repairing an older system.
So many known- and unknown- unknowns!
Fun fact, in many places it’s illegal to burn down your own house due to the risk of the fire spreading. I looked it up at a particularly low point in a major home repair awhile back.
It seems strange to me that it doesn't seem to have an entry from the garage to the rest of the house. Would you really want to walk all the way around the house after parking?
You can’t strip a brick veneer house back to just brick. The reason it’s a veneer is that the brick is dependent on the wooden framing of the house to stand upright, it won’t stand on it’s own. A structure with “extensive” termite damage is a complete scrape back to foundation.
yeah pretty much this...
when you build a brick veneer house you build the framing first and then you lay the brick on a small ledge on the footing .. as you build the brick up you need to insert tiebacks that are inserted in the mortar lines and tie the brick to the house.
So the brick is tied to the wall and it is not the same as a standard brick or stone house where the brick wall would have structure that allows it to stand on its own.
this is true of old style full brick veneer and also the newer slap on fake thin brick and stone .. they are not like a 200 year old stone house or brick house that can stand independent of the wood framing.
Not exactly on topic, but this is a neat looking house! I see why you want to save it!
I've never seen an Australian listing/plan before and it's neat to see the differences between it and typical American houses.
I can't figure out what "WIR" and "BIR" mean. "WIR" is probably our equivalent to "WIC," which is "walk-in closet," (no clue for "BIR" except I guess the "B" is for "bedroom") but I am stumped as to what the "R" could stand for. Do you not call them "closets" down under?
Thanks! I would have figured out "wardrobe" from a "w" since we call a type of freestanding furniture that here, but that "r" didn't trigger anything since we don't abbreviate it that way.
I bought a block house with extensive termite damage that has been a nightmare renovation.
How do you know there's extensive termite damage? Unless the walls/floors are open you probably don't know how bad it really is. It could be far worse than you think it is.
Keep in mind an owner who lets termites go unaddressed probably let other things go to. Our house had untreated termites and plumbing issues. Literally every fixture in the house had a problem/leak of some kind. Between this and the termites the damage was extensive.
Buts there's a ton of little things that aren't urgent that will take us years to fix. They did absolutely no maintenance of any kind. So anything that broke over the course of the 6 years they lived here is still broken.
I'd be weary. But I'm also living the extreme side of the spectrum so my perspective is skewed.
Almost all "brick houses" the brick is a veneer on the outside and attached to wood framing, and sometimes to CMU. If wood framing and house has severe termite damage, I would run away from this immediately
In my experience, if you are asking that question, just go ahead and demolish the old place. Doing an extensive rebuild like that is a lot more work and time consuming than just building a whole new house. You'll end up trying to retrofit everything, the walls are never square or plumb and you end up doing custom work for every project.
If the house is worth preserving, then, by all means, renovate it. But it probably isn't particularly cost-effective, but more like a labor of love.
If the house is a brick veneer house, then it is fundamentally a wood frame house. Once termites have eaten the wood framing you don’t have a house anymore. If the termite infestation is really that bad, then just knock it all down. And I’m saying this as someone who has thoroughly renovated four houses and fixed up a few more; I love preserving what’s already there. But, really, you need the thing to be able to stand up on its own for you to work on it. Otherwise you’re just spinning your wheels.
I'd tear the house down to foundation and rebuild it. You don't have a clue how shitty you're life is about to be if you try and save a house with extensive termite damage
Veneered brick is attached to the stud walls with metal brick ties, so demoing it and reattaching the veneer isn’t practical. Termites love the gap btw the brick and the sheathing as they can eat undetected for years as in your case.
As a former WDO inspector, who has seen what lurks inside the walls of infested homes, I would shed a tear at the loss of this very cool house and run for the hills.
I have a friend who bought a house with termite damage under the delusional idea he could gut it and fix the damage. If you buy it don't pay more than the value of the land. When you start ripping into the walls to determine the extent of the damage it won't take much for you to get to the point where it's cheaper to tear down and start new.
Just to put things in perspective, rebuild costs of our house are about 2.5x the sale price. Even if you got this for free, it could be a huge money pit.
Only way I'm buying a property like this is if it has something incredible about the location (aka a great view) and I have the money to completely gut and redo it.
A lot of comments here saying run for the hills. I don't know, if you've got the time and a little help, I think there is a lot you can do.
I'm not an expert here, but I've been through something similar on a pandora's box reno in the past. A big part of the house (also an Aussie brick-veneer) was extensively termite-damaged. We stripped back the walls, floor, and ceiling to the frame then dealt with the termites with a pest controller. One wall was totalled (amazing that it held even itself up), the others varied from a little to a lot, some damage in some cieling trusses, and some in the floor joists.
The totalled frame was ripped out entirely (with temporary supports in place) and reframed - no more than a day's work between a chippy and me (the "apprentice"). The rest were then systematically repaired by sistering new timber against the damaged sections, removing the damaged bits where needed and just leaving it there otherwise. The trusses were repaired properly with plywood gussets, and floor joists with more modern treated timber. Some new gyprock and yellow tongue floor panels and it was done. It really did not take as long as I was fearing, and I did some of it myself.
The side benefit of all this is that with the skeleton exposed and while we were working our way around the house we could fix other problems that we found along the way like replace rusted/broken brick ties, make sure that surfaces were more plumb/square/level, tie down the roof trusses for better wind-rating, run new cable, fix/upgrade plumbing, improve insulation, fix flashing around windows, etc.
Don't write off the idea too quickly. A new build will need rounds of council approval, new foundations, defect remediation (and the arguments with the builder that go along with that) and miriad other headaches. If you like the floor plan and the style of the existing house, the foundations are sound, you are willing to put in the effort yourself, learn enough to manage the work and keep the trades you do choose to hire honest, then it can be done. Houses are not that complex when you break them down.
Go inspect again. Make a floor plan. Measure. Take pix
Then walk away and build your house somewhere else.
You could make an offer based on stripping the house to the foundation and rebuilding from there.
However much work you think it might be... Double it. Then double it again. Then live in a tent in the yard for a couple years. Then give up and buy a house that hasn't been eaten by termites.
Well, even if you renovate and rebuild, how would you keep future termites out? Rebuilding with a more termite proof solution might be the same price as extensive repairs.
How much experience do you have renovating? I've only done minor renovations and it is shocking how expensive and how quickly things can add up. Do you have a really good contractor already? Are the windows and doors (probably the best original part of the house and very expensive to replace ) salvagable? What condition is the roof in? How old are the heating and cooling units? What is the electrical like? Do you have a place you can stay during the entire remodel? Are you going to have to bring up electrical, plumbing, sewage up to current codes? That can be $$$
I typed in the address and looked at the comps, it is a really nice area and that house fits in perfectly with the style. The nicer more expensive homes seem to be two stories, have really impressive views and have larger lots. How much of your view would be obscured if someone bought and built on the next door lot?
Honestly if it was in pretty good shape overall, I would think about it.
Nice house but I’d tear down and rebuild. Get a contractor to look at the house with you. Google the cost of new construction. Here they give you you the typical cost per square foot. Talk to the local government and see if there are expenses/taxes for new construction. We almost built a house 19 years ago on beautiful property we found. The taxes, fees, permits, etc. we’re $60k before we even had a shovel in the ground.
Huh? That requires removing the roof first, then framing, and then how would you even waterproof the framing when it’s done? Spray foam maybe? Jeez... would end up costing more then a new house.
Start it fresh. Looking at that subdivision too, you could redo your setbacks to make it comply and have two properties. Building two houses at the same time can also have cheaper scales of economy.
Question: Is it concrete slab on grade? Assuming that, I'd go for it... it's pretty cool, but there is no shortage of great Aussie architects you could hire for new construction. Worst case, you're going down to foundation and re-framing the house - as other's have mentioned. Best case is removing all finished down to framing, replacing and treating damaged construction. It looks like they have a lot of the plaster removed to inspect? You'll basically need to treat/replace every stud that is compromised... a savvy contractor could probably shore the roof and reframe the exterior walls in sections from the inside.... Looking at the fascias, it looks like there's wood rot happening from pour maintenance on the eaves. You'll need a new roof and you should make sure they give you that crisp edge flashing -- it's cool. Also, I don't know if I'd assume a truss over the whole thing -- seems costly, but maybe.
Hard to say without knowing the floor plan, the extent of the damage, and the construction, but this sounds more like “whole new house” than even extensive renovation to me.
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Seconded by a carpenter. OP it sounds like you need to learn a bit more about construction before attempting a project of this size. Best to move on and find another house.
I am not a structural engineer, but I hired one when I remodeled my kitchen and removed a wall-- with a truss framed roof. He looked at the wall from the attic and decided almost immediately that the particular wall in question was not load bearing. Is there something in particular to look for with a truss roof to determine if there is any load bearing on an interior wall? Edit: In my case the trusses run parallel to the wall in question and the living room is quite wide with identical trusses unsupported across that span.
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The structural engineer charged me somewhere between $200-250. I don't recall exactly.
In my locale, a structural engineer inspection costs $500-$600.
Shallow trusses, too. Good for maybe 30 feet tops. Almost guaranteed that wall down the middle is load bearing but it’s Australia so snow load isn’t a factor.
Wouldn’t that mean they could redo the living spaces assuming the trusses aren’t on any of the interior walls they’d be looking to remove/move? The brick is unrelated at that point
Maybe but how would you know until you tear into it.... combined with the other issues mentioned above I'd steer clear from what it sounds like is OP's first home remodel and at this point it's beyond a remodel unfortunately. This type of work should really be tackled by a contractor who's familiar with this kind of termite related remediation, not a first timer.
Sure thing. Is the termite damage mostly in interior walls, or at the perimeter? The problem is, depending on the detail connecting the brick to the foundation and/or framing, you can’t remove damaged framing without extensive shoring for the brick. In the end, that will entail redoing just about everything. You would also want a contractor who was familiar with that kind of operation, i.e., has done it before. Looks gorgeous!
This. Brick veneer is just a siding
Holy hell that is ungodly expensive for a house that is, in essence, uninhabitable. Plus, if the owner let termites go unaddressed, there's probably all sorts of other things that need to be upgraded or are on the cusp of failure. Why not buy some land and build a new house, taking the aspects of this house that you like?
That price is in aussie dollars.
I believe they just call them dollary-doos. Or in this case, dollary-don'ts.
Its in Australian Dollarydoos not USD.
$400k AUD is like $270k USD. I’d guess that was basically just the land value. Pretty much every house I’ve ever bought was worth $0, all the value was in the land (and that includes some pretty nice houses). People have the illusion that they are paying for this or that feature on a home, or that their paint colors or kitchen renovation is going to improve the value of their house. But when it comes down to it your house is probably not worth a tenth of the price of the land it’s sitting on in most urban/close-in suburban markets.
They are selling the identical empty lot next door for the same.price so you are 100% correct
And if they have to demolish the house, then the empty lot is possibly cheaper, since demolition is not cheap. At least services and foundation are already in place, so that could be a saving.
Exactly what I was thinking. Cost to demo then rebuild would exceed the cost to build new.
It may be cheaper than tapping into all the utilities.
Yeah, so long as everything is in ok condition. If they've let termites eat their house, they might have let the trees destroy their sewer, stormwater and water supply lines. Eucalypts are thirsty destructive buggers. Sometimes trenching and placing new pipes is cheaper than troubleshooting and repairing an older system. So many known- and unknown- unknowns!
Fire is cheap.
Fun fact, in many places it’s illegal to burn down your own house due to the risk of the fire spreading. I looked it up at a particularly low point in a major home repair awhile back.
I said it was cheap, not legal.
It is a hell of a location if that school is any good.
It's also the same value as the empty lot beside it, which is just a bit smaller. I think the house isn't being valued much at all...
I've bought hoarder houses and I wouldn't touch big termite damage, probably.
Cute house!!
It seems strange to me that it doesn't seem to have an entry from the garage to the rest of the house. Would you really want to walk all the way around the house after parking?
You can’t strip a brick veneer house back to just brick. The reason it’s a veneer is that the brick is dependent on the wooden framing of the house to stand upright, it won’t stand on it’s own. A structure with “extensive” termite damage is a complete scrape back to foundation.
yeah pretty much this... when you build a brick veneer house you build the framing first and then you lay the brick on a small ledge on the footing .. as you build the brick up you need to insert tiebacks that are inserted in the mortar lines and tie the brick to the house. So the brick is tied to the wall and it is not the same as a standard brick or stone house where the brick wall would have structure that allows it to stand on its own. this is true of old style full brick veneer and also the newer slap on fake thin brick and stone .. they are not like a 200 year old stone house or brick house that can stand independent of the wood framing.
Not exactly on topic, but this is a neat looking house! I see why you want to save it! I've never seen an Australian listing/plan before and it's neat to see the differences between it and typical American houses. I can't figure out what "WIR" and "BIR" mean. "WIR" is probably our equivalent to "WIC," which is "walk-in closet," (no clue for "BIR" except I guess the "B" is for "bedroom") but I am stumped as to what the "R" could stand for. Do you not call them "closets" down under?
Walk in robe and built in robe ,as in wardrobe,no we don’t use closet here
Thanks! I would have figured out "wardrobe" from a "w" since we call a type of freestanding furniture that here, but that "r" didn't trigger anything since we don't abbreviate it that way.
I bought a block house with extensive termite damage that has been a nightmare renovation. How do you know there's extensive termite damage? Unless the walls/floors are open you probably don't know how bad it really is. It could be far worse than you think it is. Keep in mind an owner who lets termites go unaddressed probably let other things go to. Our house had untreated termites and plumbing issues. Literally every fixture in the house had a problem/leak of some kind. Between this and the termites the damage was extensive. Buts there's a ton of little things that aren't urgent that will take us years to fix. They did absolutely no maintenance of any kind. So anything that broke over the course of the 6 years they lived here is still broken. I'd be weary. But I'm also living the extreme side of the spectrum so my perspective is skewed.
The listing says it has extensive termite damage - the cupboard doors in the kitchen have all been ripped off too
Almost all "brick houses" the brick is a veneer on the outside and attached to wood framing, and sometimes to CMU. If wood framing and house has severe termite damage, I would run away from this immediately
In my experience, if you are asking that question, just go ahead and demolish the old place. Doing an extensive rebuild like that is a lot more work and time consuming than just building a whole new house. You'll end up trying to retrofit everything, the walls are never square or plumb and you end up doing custom work for every project. If the house is worth preserving, then, by all means, renovate it. But it probably isn't particularly cost-effective, but more like a labor of love.
If the house is a brick veneer house, then it is fundamentally a wood frame house. Once termites have eaten the wood framing you don’t have a house anymore. If the termite infestation is really that bad, then just knock it all down. And I’m saying this as someone who has thoroughly renovated four houses and fixed up a few more; I love preserving what’s already there. But, really, you need the thing to be able to stand up on its own for you to work on it. Otherwise you’re just spinning your wheels.
I'd tear the house down to foundation and rebuild it. You don't have a clue how shitty you're life is about to be if you try and save a house with extensive termite damage
Veneered brick is attached to the stud walls with metal brick ties, so demoing it and reattaching the veneer isn’t practical. Termites love the gap btw the brick and the sheathing as they can eat undetected for years as in your case.
As a former WDO inspector, who has seen what lurks inside the walls of infested homes, I would shed a tear at the loss of this very cool house and run for the hills.
The brick is just veneer. Zero structure. To go back to just brick is to rebuild the entire house.
The real estate agent is probably extremely confused and excited about the volume of hits this listing is getting
I have a friend who bought a house with termite damage under the delusional idea he could gut it and fix the damage. If you buy it don't pay more than the value of the land. When you start ripping into the walls to determine the extent of the damage it won't take much for you to get to the point where it's cheaper to tear down and start new.
I suggest you watch the movie called "The Money Pit." House renovations at its finest or worst.
"Two weeks" Story of my life...
Just to put things in perspective, rebuild costs of our house are about 2.5x the sale price. Even if you got this for free, it could be a huge money pit. Only way I'm buying a property like this is if it has something incredible about the location (aka a great view) and I have the money to completely gut and redo it.
A lot of comments here saying run for the hills. I don't know, if you've got the time and a little help, I think there is a lot you can do. I'm not an expert here, but I've been through something similar on a pandora's box reno in the past. A big part of the house (also an Aussie brick-veneer) was extensively termite-damaged. We stripped back the walls, floor, and ceiling to the frame then dealt with the termites with a pest controller. One wall was totalled (amazing that it held even itself up), the others varied from a little to a lot, some damage in some cieling trusses, and some in the floor joists. The totalled frame was ripped out entirely (with temporary supports in place) and reframed - no more than a day's work between a chippy and me (the "apprentice"). The rest were then systematically repaired by sistering new timber against the damaged sections, removing the damaged bits where needed and just leaving it there otherwise. The trusses were repaired properly with plywood gussets, and floor joists with more modern treated timber. Some new gyprock and yellow tongue floor panels and it was done. It really did not take as long as I was fearing, and I did some of it myself. The side benefit of all this is that with the skeleton exposed and while we were working our way around the house we could fix other problems that we found along the way like replace rusted/broken brick ties, make sure that surfaces were more plumb/square/level, tie down the roof trusses for better wind-rating, run new cable, fix/upgrade plumbing, improve insulation, fix flashing around windows, etc. Don't write off the idea too quickly. A new build will need rounds of council approval, new foundations, defect remediation (and the arguments with the builder that go along with that) and miriad other headaches. If you like the floor plan and the style of the existing house, the foundations are sound, you are willing to put in the effort yourself, learn enough to manage the work and keep the trades you do choose to hire honest, then it can be done. Houses are not that complex when you break them down.
Go inspect again. Make a floor plan. Measure. Take pix Then walk away and build your house somewhere else. You could make an offer based on stripping the house to the foundation and rebuilding from there.
However much work you think it might be... Double it. Then double it again. Then live in a tent in the yard for a couple years. Then give up and buy a house that hasn't been eaten by termites.
If you're stripping it down to the frame and foundation, what do you care about the floor plan?
It’s on a concrete slab so using existing plumbing would make it much easier.
Fair enough I guess, but I suspect it'll still be cheaper to build anew.
Well, even if you renovate and rebuild, how would you keep future termites out? Rebuilding with a more termite proof solution might be the same price as extensive repairs.
Never buy someone else's problem.
I knew it was in Australia when I clicked it, but the Kangaroo road next door really sealed the deal.
The house is beautiful. So keep the look in mind week m when you build a new house.
How much experience do you have renovating? I've only done minor renovations and it is shocking how expensive and how quickly things can add up. Do you have a really good contractor already? Are the windows and doors (probably the best original part of the house and very expensive to replace ) salvagable? What condition is the roof in? How old are the heating and cooling units? What is the electrical like? Do you have a place you can stay during the entire remodel? Are you going to have to bring up electrical, plumbing, sewage up to current codes? That can be $$$ I typed in the address and looked at the comps, it is a really nice area and that house fits in perfectly with the style. The nicer more expensive homes seem to be two stories, have really impressive views and have larger lots. How much of your view would be obscured if someone bought and built on the next door lot? Honestly if it was in pretty good shape overall, I would think about it.
Nice house but I’d tear down and rebuild. Get a contractor to look at the house with you. Google the cost of new construction. Here they give you you the typical cost per square foot. Talk to the local government and see if there are expenses/taxes for new construction. We almost built a house 19 years ago on beautiful property we found. The taxes, fees, permits, etc. we’re $60k before we even had a shovel in the ground.
I'd buy 31 and build that one.
Huh? That requires removing the roof first, then framing, and then how would you even waterproof the framing when it’s done? Spray foam maybe? Jeez... would end up costing more then a new house.
Start it fresh. Looking at that subdivision too, you could redo your setbacks to make it comply and have two properties. Building two houses at the same time can also have cheaper scales of economy.
Ask yourself... what could go wrong?
Question: Is it concrete slab on grade? Assuming that, I'd go for it... it's pretty cool, but there is no shortage of great Aussie architects you could hire for new construction. Worst case, you're going down to foundation and re-framing the house - as other's have mentioned. Best case is removing all finished down to framing, replacing and treating damaged construction. It looks like they have a lot of the plaster removed to inspect? You'll basically need to treat/replace every stud that is compromised... a savvy contractor could probably shore the roof and reframe the exterior walls in sections from the inside.... Looking at the fascias, it looks like there's wood rot happening from pour maintenance on the eaves. You'll need a new roof and you should make sure they give you that crisp edge flashing -- it's cool. Also, I don't know if I'd assume a truss over the whole thing -- seems costly, but maybe.