Split face block

[Mike Lamb]

What Kurt said.

Get some honest estimates as to what it costs to rebuild an outside bearing wall. If you don't already own the building or even if you do, I'd say it's crazy.

[Jerry Simon]

Why rebuild? Simply have the block wall clad with aluminum or vinyl siding.

[kurt]

I'm in a growth industry in Chicago where we're trying to figure out how to fix these things. Honest, I've got 6 calls this week alone. After the Channel 7 thing, folks now call me, Hier, or Decker.

Siding can work, but there's a lot of stuff most folks won't go for. Sometimes access is nonexistent. Other times folks just don't want siding.

Everyone's looking for the silver bullet. There isn't one. This is a full scale disaster that's going to keep getting worse.

So, don't think you're going to pick up a short sale bargain and buff it up into coolness. It'll remain a soaker until you drop about $50,000 into it, and even then, no guarantee it isn't going to leak somewhere else.

These things are seriously fooked up.

[Brad Manor]

I was called to look at a split face block bldg this morning. To make things more interesting, the two storey windows and the surrounding blocks protruded about 2.5 inches from the face of the building. Water was bleeding from the holes in the window frames.

-B

[kurt]

Amazing numbers of these things were tossed up. Single wythe block, no idea of what flashing means, furring slammed onto the interior face, 1 1/2" yellow insulation bet. furring, vapor retarder (invariably visqueen), drywall.

Sometimes you can see the bleed through on the drywall.

I've opened up coping and found cores running water. Top cord bearing truss on wet block, punk tree farm wood. No bargains on split face block.

[Tom Raymond]

I still don't get why anyone would want to build a house that looks like Walmart? Bleck!