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A friend of mine lives in a house that is close to an old gravel pit, the land for which is owned by the City Council. Over the years three trees have been cut down due to them being dangerous. The gravel pit was filled in years ago but is clearly moving as his fence is leaning badly and he has had to "fix" the issue when it gets too bad. He had a crack on his garage wall (the garage is attached to the house) some years ago which he filled and doesn't he says appear to have got worse. He has to renew his house insurance and there are new questions on the proposal form regarding subsidence. He is unsure if the landslip he is experiencing would be classed as subsidence and whether he should declare it. He has largely ignored the problem for years but he is now at an age where he realises that this needs to be sorted to avoid issues for his sons when they come to sell after he and his wife die. If it is subsidence could he sue the City Council? I have advised him to get a professional inspection done.
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Wait for other members to advise.
But the sensible thing to do is make a claim on the existing policy today, the issue will be when did he first find out about it?
Waiting for it to get worst isn't always the best option. -
You mention a proposal form so presumably your friend is considering allowing his existing policy to lapse and replacing it at renewal with another insurer.
I would advise against that course of action.
He would be better (as echat11 ) lodging a claim and renewing with the current insurer.Comment
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Please google samantha mendez admiral.com subsidence and read her article which explains subsidence in detail. Land heave is not subsidence.
Insurance companies normally have an excess of about £1k for subsidence claims. This excess could be spent on a surveyor or engineer commissioned by the insurance company to inspect cracks, monitoring them over a period of time and producing a report. This report might end with the surveyor or engineer believing that subsidence has not caused the cracking.
In any future sale of the property the vendor must declare the building has suffered from subsidence which could make the property more difficult to sell and affect its value.
Since the hurricane in the 80s fencing is not covered by buildings insurance.
My advice is to contact the City Council about the problem. The Council may have their own surveyors or engineers to carry out a site inspection..Comment
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Apparently a building surveyor or structural engineer to monitor cracks uses tell-tales. Something a customer doesn't want to do to his or her insurance company.Comment
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The Council will more then likely refer the OP to his insurance company to deal with.
Council's don't like to deal with claims of any sort.
What the insurance company does is hire a surveillance company that carry's our measurements very accurately, places markers and measure every 3 / 4 months for movement. Then they'll be able to see if a claim can be made or not.
Then you have evidence to make a claim against the Council which the insurance company handles.
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