Does anyone have experience with a house where the 1/2 the backyard has slid away? The renters had to move out, not condemned yet, and the house in general is in disrepair.
Thanks!
Don’t mess around with this. Call in the County if they’re available. Call in a local builder that has specific experience in this type of problem…in this specific area. Ask them directly, “What can I do to save this home?”
First of all, how high up the hill is this home? If it’s ten feet, that’s one thing. If it’s a hundred and ten feet, that’s something else. One very important factor here is going to be the particulars of the landslide. Why did it happen? Can it happen again? If so, it would be academic for me. I’d walk away. Even if it’s due to the recent torrential rains in Cali (I don’t know if you’ve been affected where you are), I’d have to say that buying a house on a cliff isn’t one of my first choices, but people do it all the time. Too, finding out the geological characteristics of that plot of land and whether or not it’s going to be stable in the long term, may be…I say again, ‘may be’, expensive. Assuming for a moment that the land isn’t stable and will slide again if unchecked, you’re obviously talking about some sort of retaining system. This is where the height of the cliff and the soil composition comes into play. If it’s only a matter of a few meters, It may be just a question of getting a landscaper in there to do some digging, rock walls and some plantings. I may get in trouble for saying this, but, if it’s more than fifteen feet high and sixty feet long and you don’t have a truckload of cash to play with, turn around, take off your tool belt, remove the pencil from behind your ear and scratch off this address from every sheet of paper in your possession. Don’t look back. Go to the next one. If you find that you just don’t want to let this one go…that may be the best reason to, in fact, GO. There are a number of issues I haven’t touched on because of the lack of information about this parcel. I would like to hear more about it. Please post again and tell us a bit more of the specifics of the slide. If it’s not a long slide then there are solutions.