This is ‘lateral movement’ and not subsidence. Ok, its still not great news and it would eventually cost me £30,000 to put right, but the damage looked so bad it enabled me to negotiate £150,000 off the asking price and get an absolute bargain. Not a bad days work.

The more you look at buildings and understand how they work you begin to see them as living, breathing animals. Ok, now I am sounding like a lunatic, but let me explain. Buildings like to breathe and have lots of fresh air in the summer so we ventilate them, they like to stay warm in the winter so we heat them, and they like to stay dry so we protect them, but surprisingly they also like to move. Most building materials expand and contract throughout the year due to changes in temperature. This is why its good to design in flexibility into the building by using things like flexible adhesive for your bathroom tiling or by installing expansion joints when you build a brick wall.

Your home can also move depending on the condition of the ground it is built on. In parts of Britain where homes are constructed on clay there can be a lot of ground movement between the summer, when it is warm and dry, and the winter when it is cold and wet. This ground movement can cause small cracks in the summer, which then close up again in the winter. There isn’t a lot you can do about this and it’s often nothing to worry about.

One of the most common structural problems I see in period homes is cracking around bay windows. This is often caused by the structure of the bay window pulling away from the main body of the house, which can easily be put right using structural ties to strap it back together, or more worryingly, by root damage caused by trees on the street. Tree roots are lethal to buildings and the only way you can put this damage right is to install a new concrete foundation.

If you find more substantial cracking to the outside of the building where the crack goes all the way down to ground level and down to the foundation then the alarm bells should start ringing. This is subsidence and the only way you can put this right is to underpin the property.

Underpinning is a process where you dig out lengths of the existing foundation and put a new concrete foundation under the existing wall. This is done in small stages so as not to undermine the structural integrity of the building. Although you may have heard the story about the multi-million pound house in Notting Hill that completely collapsed when the underpinning contractor dug out too much soil in one go! Underpinning can be a frightening and very expensive process. Make sure you use an approved underpinning contractor for any of this work. See the Association of specialist Underpinning Contractors at www.asuc.org.uk.

No matter how old your home is, or which area of the country you live in, make sure you are fully covered for subsidence on your building insurance because by the time you see the damage it is often too late. Good insurance helps you sleep at night.

If there are any large trees close to your house keep them trimmed back to minimise the spread of roots and if you see any substantial structural movement contact a structural engineer or surveyor. They will assess the damage and suggest the best course of action. See the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors at www.rics.org.

Remember all buildings like to move, but hopefully, not too much.

To help write the column this month I thought I’d walk around my home in Dorset with pen and paper to make my own annual maintenance list. It’s a typical 4-bedroom detached house in a very exposed position so it’s a perfect building to demonstrate common UK maintenance problems.

The building is rendered on the outside and painted white and it is pretty clear that the winter frost has been the building’s worst enemy. There are areas where the paintwork has peeled off the walls and allowed water to penetrate the render.
This water has then frozen inside the render, the ice expands and forces the render to crumble away from the wall. The paint and render is essential to prevent the walls from becoming damp so the render must be repaired and repainted.

If the outside of your home is brickwork similar damage can occur to the mortar joints between your bricks. Cement mortar can suffer terribly from frost damage. If this happens on your home arrange for a bricklayer to ‘rake-out’ the damaged mortar and re-point the effected areas.

Next, take a look at your windows. If they are timber windows, rather than UPVC, they must be regularly inspected as the protective paint can flake off during cold spells. Also check that all of the window seals and the putty around your glass have not fallen out. If it has, have a glazer redo the putty around the glass and once set you can give the timber frames a light sanding down and repaint.

If you have single glazed windows always check for damp damage to paint and timber inside the house. This damage is caused by high levels of condensation where warm, moist air inside your home condenses on the inside face of the cold glass. The only way you can avoid this is by providing high levels of ventilation inside your home or, if you have the budget, by installing double-glazing.

Next up, the roof. My roof is a natural slate roof. I can see that a couple of the slates are cracked and there is even one missing. This can be caused again by frost, which will find any weakness or fault in a natural material, or if over time the tile has come loose then strong winds will cause the tile to vibrate and crack. These problems are common in most roof tiles. Have a roofer come and replace the damaged tiles and to carry out an inspection to see if any other tiles need to be re-secured.

Then there is your roof guttering. My gutters are full of dead leaves that fell in the autumn. This causes the UPVC pipes to block and the water over-flows over the top of the guttering and down the face of my walls. What a mess. Worse still the water that is blocked in the gutter can freeze, expand, and cause the pipes and gutters to crack causing alot of damage. Fortunately my pipes have not cracked, but the gutters look a terrible mess. Have all guttering and pipes cleared of all debris after the autumn and before the cold weather kicks in.

To correct these minor problems on my house will take a few days work and a few hundred pounds.

Leave the problems to get worse and worse, year after year and not only will your once beautiful home look an absolute mess, but one day you will be looking at a maintenance bill of thousands of pounds! Please, please keep an eye on any problems or defects. Regular inspections and maintenance work can save you a fortune.

Start with contacting the Environment Agency. They have the most thorough information regarding flood risk in Britain. You can type in your postcode on their web site and it will give you a full assessment of flood risk in your area (I did a quick search for my own home in Dorset and their was a 0.1% or less chance of my home flooding…phew!).

If you live in a low risk area then great, you have nothing to worry about but if you live in an area where regular floods occur then there are practical steps you can take to protect your home. I’ve recently installed a ‘Flood Board’ system and ‘Airbrick Covers’ on an existing home for a client who had had enough of flood damage to her home.
The boards and covers are stored in her garage and are then temporarily clipped into place to block up door and window openings up to a particular height to prevent any water getting in. These simple defences are very effective, easy to install and will save you a lot of stress and heartache.

If you are intending to build a new home in an area liable to flooding then the Environment Agency will ask for specific design criteria during the planning process that you must adhere to.
For example I designed a new home in Surrey close to a flood plain and we had to raise the entire house over 2 feet off the ground so water could pass freely beneath the floor slab in times of flooding.
These requirements can add considerable cost to the budget of your new home, but you have to do them, as they are there to protect you and your home.

Finally, make sure you have a very good insurance policy for the structure of your home as well as all of your contents to protect you fully against flood damage.
I’ve known people forget to renew their insurance or haven’t read the small print on their policy and when a flood occurs their lives are devastated.

The Environment Agency can let you know if there is a risk of an imminent flood during periods of heavy rainfall. If you are concerned you can call their ‘Floodline’ 24-hours a day on 0845 988 1188 for real time updates.

Floods are going to be a regular occurrence in this country.
Its your responsibility to make sure you take the appropriate steps to protect yourself and your home against them.