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Anyone know anything about water leaks?

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scarletjim
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Anyone know anything about water leaks?

Post by scarletjim »

I have a problem that I posted on a few plumbing forums earlier, with little or no response, then my girlfriend said to me 'why don't you just post it on your fantasy football forum, those people seem to know about everything' (!) So here goes...!!! (Excuse poor formatting):

***********************************

Could damp walls resulting from a pretty serious leak be dangerous to the flat below mine later? Let me explain:

3 weeks ago a leak was identified in my flat. The water was gushing out of a pipe in the water cylinder cupboard pretty seriously, and we’ve no idea how long it had been like that (tenants were on holiday). Obviously we turned off the water, and next day a plumber came to fix the pipe. Visibly there was no damage in my flat, but in the flat below the lady apparently needed to have her hallway ceiling repainted, and her electrics checked. (It’s a leasehold block of flats, so of all of that would normally be managed via the buildings insurance taken out by the managing agent – or at least that’s how it should happen I believe…).

3 weeks down the line, my hallway now has damp marks – 4 pictures here:

http://tinypic.com/a/abpds9/4
(Please let me know if the pictures don’t work).

So I have a few questions:
• How bad is the problem – can you judge by the photos?
• Given that the amount of water leaking out was pretty significant, where will it all have gone? Is it all sitting in the ‘crawl space’ between my floor and the flat below’s ceiling? Or must it have drained off elsewhere somehow?
• Is it dangerous? What is the likelihood that the ceiling of the flat below will suffer future damage resulting from this water, possibly even cave in altogether?
• With regard to insurance, is it too late now for me to claim my damp walls on the same insurance claim? I believe the managing agent was reluctant to make the claim, saying that the damage to the flat below was only £200 so no point in bothering, but presumably it could end up being a lot more given the above…
• If I ask the managing agent to claim for my damp walls, and any repairs / water removal resulting, and they refuse (which sounds likely), who will be responsible if there is a bigger problem relating to that water in a few months time?
• If they agree to make the claim, will the insurance company say that we should have told them 3 weeks ago? (Even though there were no marks on the walls then).
• What would you do? I have a few options:

1. I can run a couple of dehumidifiers to see if they dry the walls.
2. I can pay for a professional tradesman to look at it (a plumber? Or another trade?)
3. I can request the managing agent to get their insurance to deal with it. (But they are already annoyed with me because the leak happened at all – as though it was my fault! :/ )

Would appreciate any advice anyone can give, even if only on small individual aspects of the above - thanks. :)

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Dennisthemenace
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Re: Anyone know anything about water leaks?

Post by Dennisthemenace »

I once had a leak in an upstairs flat from a 'pinhole' in a pipe under the bath. It caused a serious case of mould to grow in the bathroom of the bloke downstairs. He just painted it and it solved the problem! It was summer so I'm guessing it helped to dry out any water that was still there.

As it's been bloody freezing for weeks now I'm guessing your moisture is still finding a way through and that's the damp patches you see.

I think I'd ring the plumber up who fixed your pipe and tell him you don't think it can be fixed properly as you've got damp coming through your walls. He may defend himself by saying exactly what I've just said above or he may come out and double-check. Either way, at least it'll give you some piece of mind.

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bloggie
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Re: Anyone know anything about water leaks?

Post by bloggie »

The damps walls not being outside walls proves it's not just rising damp.
'WHAT ARE YOUR CONTRACTUAL RIGHTS?
First and foremost, the right of ”quiet enjoyment” of the flat for the term of the lease, this right is implied by law ,even if it is not set out in the lease. “Quiet enjoyment “means the right to reside in the premises without, unreasonable, interference from the landlord. In addition, the leaseholder has the right to expect the landlord to maintain and repair the building and manage the common parts – that is, the parts of the building or grounds not specifically granted to the leaseholder in the lease but to which there are rights of access, for example, the entrance hall and staircases.
Occasionally, the leaseholders may have “self –repairing “leases, where they are responsible for the maintenance and repair of their own flats. This will be usually be when there are only two flats in the building.'
https://www.lease-advice.org/advice-gui ... ats-guide/

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scarletjim
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Re: Anyone know anything about water leaks?

Post by scarletjim »

Thanks guys. Just to update you, out of courtesy as much as anything else, after I quoted a few pieces of legislation to the managing agent, they got their own maintenance man to come and take a look, and he says that it just needs painting (which he will do) then it will be fine. And to be fair, it is now 4 weeks since the leak happened, and the flat downstairs haven't had any more water on their ceiling since then, so perhaps he is right. In any case, I've emailed the managing agent this morning to say that if they don't believe it warrants proper inspection, then on their heads be it if a problem arises later... Cheers. :)

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blahblah
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Re: Anyone know anything about water leaks?

Post by blahblah »

Apologies for the delay, but I did say PM me to remind me, lol.

The damp could well be residual from the flood\leak as the water disperses, and could still be spreading. The best place to check is near where the leak started to make sure it is dry there...

If the ceiling below hasn't caved in yet, then I doubt it will now, assuming the above, ie leak fixed.

Insurance: if this was a simple domestic (ie owned\mortgaged) place then the carpet could well get replaced. Apologies, if I missed it, but you didn't say if the flat has rads, and where the leak came from.... Water in carpet can be an automatic replacement.

Who pays the Insurance and who is it with? If it has anything to do with them, then they have a vested interest in not paying out, so their opinion is a tad biased.

The wall(s) are the least of the problem from the pics, once the latent (not the right word, but hey ho) water in the plaster, cement etc is sorted, but the wood could get tricky.

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Hotpot
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Re: Anyone know anything about water leaks?

Post by Hotpot »

scarletjim wrote: 13 Mar 2018, 21:40 then my girlfriend said to me 'why don't you just post it on your fantasy football forum, those people seem to know about everything' (!)

Normally I would've suggested asking the Mrs, as the Mrs seems to know about everything.

You could be going around in circles!

:D

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scarletjim
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Re: Anyone know anything about water leaks?

Post by scarletjim »

blahblah wrote: 17 Mar 2018, 15:11 Apologies for the delay, but I did say PM me to remind me, lol.

The damp could well be residual from the flood\leak as the water disperses, and could still be spreading. The best place to check is near where the leak started to make sure it is dry there...

If the ceiling below hasn't caved in yet, then I doubt it will now, assuming the above, ie leak fixed.

Insurance: if this was a simple domestic (ie owned\mortgaged) place then the carpet could well get replaced. Apologies, if I missed it, but you didn't say if the flat has rads, and where the leak came from.... Water in carpet can be an automatic replacement.

Who pays the Insurance and who is it with? If it has anything to do with them, then they have a vested interest in not paying out, so their opinion is a tad biased.

The wall(s) are the least of the problem from the pics, once the latent (not the right word, but hey ho) water in the plaster, cement etc is sorted, but the wood could get tricky.

Hmm, I didn't mention the insurance hassles I've had... The managing agent is the residents association of the complex - which is basically two old men with Hitler complexes who do pretty much whatever they like irrespective of what the law says they can / should do. I've had numerous arguments with them since they took over the management a few years ago. In this instance, they had previously said that because the water came from my flat, I have to pay for any damages myself (and to those for the flat below too!). It was only late last week that, having quoted various pieces of legislation to them, they finally agreed to do something about it themselves. (Obviously I pay my service charge, part of which pays for insurance, so that's what they should be claiming on). Anyway that side of things is of less interest to me now, as I'm selling the flat anyway.

The leak originally came from a cold water pipe that feeds the (immersion heated) water cylinder. The maintenance man let me know about it just over a month ago, I got there as soon as I could and turned off the water obviously, until it could be fixed a couple of days later. It has definitely not leaked at all since then. The problem is, we've no idea how long it had been leaking, as my tenants were at that point coming to the end of a two-week holiday abroad - so it could have been leaking for anything from a few hours to almost 2 weeks!

Thankfully there is no damage to our flooring, and the flat below has had the ceiling painted. If I understand the construction of my building correctly, there is no wood (it's an old office building that was converted to flats in 1999) - I think it's just huge slabs of concrete between my floor and the flat bellow's ceiling. And, as you say, if nothing has happened in the last 4 weeks, then maybe it's safe enough to assume that it won't now. Fingers crossed...
Last edited by scarletjim on 18 Mar 2018, 09:40, edited 1 time in total.

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scarletjim
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Re: Anyone know anything about water leaks?

Post by scarletjim »

Hotpot wrote: 17 Mar 2018, 19:41
scarletjim wrote: 13 Mar 2018, 21:40 then my girlfriend said to me 'why don't you just post it on your fantasy football forum, those people seem to know about everything' (!)

Normally I would've suggested asking the Mrs, as the Mrs seems to know about everything.

You could be going around in circles!

:D

:lol: I think my GF has heard me talk so much about the people on FISO over the years that she holds the whole community in very high esteem. I have said to her on many occasions that if I want a sensible debate on something, or a genuinely objective opinion or bit of advice, then this is my go-to place on the whole internet. (As long as it's not football related of course... :wink: :lol: )

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