If you’re worried that your house has damages, one of the ways that you can double check your suspicion is to check the house on your own. However, if you don’t know where to look first, you can hire a contractor who’s skilled in Mesquite foundation repair. There are small warning signs that you can look out for. The foundation, roof, walls and windows and their conditions will help you know the extent of the damage. This article will help you learn more about that.  

  1. Settling and Leaning Structures 

One of the ways that a foundation gets damaged over time is a poor construction. A diligent construction will affect the structural integrity of a building. Cracks in the walls, jarring windows and stuck doors are the basic signs that the building was poorly constructed. Settling and leaning structures will happen naturally. To check if these framed-in features are fine, use a level to check if the walls stand upright. If the windows and doors won’t close or open, its framework might have been in too much stress from the slanted or settling walls.  

  1. Foundation 

To check your foundation, grab a flashlight and inspect the walls of the crawlspace. These walls are attached to the foundation by joints or bolted plates. Check if the joints are poorly aligned or if the bolts are loose. You might see hairline cracks but these are harmless. Check for the large cracks instead especially the ones that are narrow downwards and wide at the top. Horizontal cracks are signs that the house is pushed off its footings or already sliding.  

  1. Rotting Joists and Shifting 

Rotting joists are costly repairs so to check if the joists are rotten or not, poke your head through the panel and use a screwdriver to jab the wood. But if the damage is caused by shifting, it’s not an alarm yet but you should have them inspected. A damage caused by rotting is dangerous.  For example, homes tend to have cracks because of expansion especially if the house experiences extreme change of temperature.  

Even the daily changes of the temperature could be a factor of shifting. The house adjusts from the cooling period overnight to the warmth during the day and all over again. So hire an inspector to check what repairs your house needs.  

  1. Roof and Load-Bearing Walls 

The shifting of the ground caused by a natural disaster like earthquakes or from the changing temperature can cause the walls that bear the loads move off their marks. These walls are strategically placed between the lower footings and upper roof supports. Most of the exterior walls are load-bearing walls. To check if shifting happened, go to a distance from the house and check the roofline.  

If it appears to be swaying in the middle or drooping at its ends, it’s possible that the upper support of the wall has shifted. If you’re buying a house, make sure that you hire an inspector to take a detailed look at the structure for any structural damage.