Expert: Dan Griffin - 5/12/2008

Question
I am looking at a home for sale that has a disclosure showing that the home had structural damage that was repaired in the foundation and with a life time guarantee. Am I safe to purchase this property and what chances do we have that we would have future problems. The home is in southlake Texas.

Answer
It would make some difference what the structural repair was and who/how it was performed.  Many homes show cracks in the exterior brick work due to movement of the footing , usually in highly expansive clay soils.  There are companies that specialize in jacking these footings up and closing the brick joints, etc.  If this is the type of repair, I would consider it fairly normal.  I'm not sure where Southlake is, but there are many areas in Texas where builders have gone to post tension slab/footings to try to overcome some of these problems.

Do a bit more research, but if structural deficiencies have been diagnosed by a structural engineer, and his directives have been followed, I would feel pretty comfortable.