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Woodworm Treatment - No Guarantees?


iSelfBuild

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The house I bought before Christmas has quite a lot of wood worm, the floor boards are quite bad in some rooms but it hasn't made it's way into the floor joists. None of the boards are that far gone that they need replacing to be honest.

I have just got round to spraying the timbers and I finished the loft tonight after removing all the insulation, cobwebs and hoovering all the dust and debris out. I'm doing a proper job as there's no point me bothering at all if I do it half hearted but I am concerned about not having a guarantee. I plan to sell the house in 2 - 3 years at the most and I'm wondering whether it could be worth the money to get someone in and spray the lot and issue a guarantee. I think it would come up on the survey again that there is signs of woodworm and It may put off a buyer that I did a DIY job...

What do people think? Any ideas on the price for a 2 bed house. There is easy access on the ground floor with plenty of crawl space, I'm just starting to take up the boards on the first floor and swearing quite a lot... I hate that job!

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I had woodworm treatment done at our previous house, a 2 bed semi detached 1930's house. It was a long time ago and I don't have a clue about how much it cost but it was a mortgage condition because it was raised on the survey.

When we sold it 13 years later (after extending it and nearly doubling it's size) nobody asked for any paperwork in relartion to the woodwork and it was not "found" on the buyers survey.

I don't think they did a particularly thorough job, just lifted a few boards and sprayed as far as their lance would reach with no particular attention to whether they missed bits or not.  The worst wodworm was in the back board behind the electricity meter, which I replaced with a new board.

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Woodworm can't digest wood that is dry, normally in homes all the wood is so dry it does not get atacked 

sometimes near WCs or the ridge board (that does nothing antyway) can get some.

they like glue in some on plywoods too.

I see woodworm treatment as an unnecessary, often toxic waste of time.

 

 

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My advice would be if you don't need it to secure/satistify mortgage, do it yourself. `nasty job, but you will do it properly. I defy you to find a company that doesn't do a name change on regular basis, thus negating guarantee.

 

Best, Mafalda

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  • 3 weeks later...

Personally myself I would replace the woodworm boards. From what I understand a house survey is often just observational and few surveyors are probably not going to want the liability of judging whether the worms have gone or not. Otherwise you risk putting off buyers, a sale collapsing or buyers asking for a reduction as a point of negotiation. So it would be far cheaper to replace the boards, particularly the obvious ones that can be easily seen. You can get a cheap spray can or two of wormworm killer of the internet and spray around infected areas and prone areas afterwards for good measure. Then just monitor the situation every so often. That's my thoughts on it. 

Edited by Gimp
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  • 1 month later...

I donned a respirator and disposable overalls and did our old house myself when I discovered it had woodworm in the past and there were new timbers in place here and there, but the sellers had not mentioned it (unsurprisingly I suppose) so I was unsure if it had been treated. So in fact, I actually did it all twice over to be certain!  Our own surveyor had not picked it up. I then did what Gimp says above and also covered the old floorboards with hardboard as they'd been badly laid anyway and were a bit uneven,  this made a nice flat floor for our new carpets and flooring. I checked for fresh sawdust reasonably regularly for the years we were in that house and it showed no recurrence.  

 

Edited by curlewhouse
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