Damp Proofing Watford

Damp in Watford Homes

Watford grew up as a railway and printing town on the edge of London, and its housing tells that story. The oldest stock sits close to the High Street, Watford Junction and the Callowland and Oxhey Village conservation areas: solid brick Victorian and Edwardian terraces, built in old London stock brick with no cavity and, in many cases, no effective damp proof course. Where the original slate or bitumen course has broken down, or was never there, and where later owners have applied hard cement render outside and gypsum plaster inside, moisture is sealed into the wall with nowhere to go. That is the classic recipe for rising damp, and it is why these streets produce the tide marks, salting and crumbling plaster that people picture when they think of damp.

Move out to Nascot Wood, North Watford, Cassiobury, Bushey and Carpenders Park and the picture changes. These areas were built out between the wars, largely as 1920s and 1930s semis with cavity walls, timber bays and rendered gables. They should not suffer rising damp at all, but many now do show penetrating damp: bay roofs that have failed, render that has cracked and let water behind it, cavities bridged by decades of debris or rusted wall ties, and pointing that has weathered away. Because so many of these houses have had new double glazing, cavity insulation and draught proofing without any thought given to ventilation, condensation and black mould have become just as common as water coming through the fabric.

South Oxhey is different again. The estate was built quickly from the late 1940s by the London County Council to rehouse Londoners, and its houses and flats are generally sound, but they were never designed to be as airtight as they are today. Add a busy family, drying laundry indoors and heating that is switched on and off, and the result is mould in cold corners, behind wardrobes and around window reveals. The same is true of the new-build and converted flats around Watford Junction, the Ascot Road and Clarendon Road developments and the regenerated town centre, where sealed units and small floor areas make condensation the dominant problem. The 1950s and 1960s council and ex-council housing in Garston, Leavesden and Meriden follows the same pattern. In all these cases the fix is ventilation, not a damp proof course, and a survey that says so honestly saves the homeowner a great deal of money.

Finally, geography plays a part. Watford sits where the Colne and Gade valleys cut through the chalk and clay-with-flints of the Chiltern dip slope. Higher ground in Nascot Wood and Cassiobury drains well, but the lower areas near the rivers, Cassiobury Park, West Watford and out towards Croxley Green can carry a locally high water table. Cellars under older terraces and shops near the town centre, and any below-ground room near the rivers, can see persistent ground damp that no amount of plaster will cure and that needs a properly designed waterproofing system instead.

With that much variety inside one town, the only sensible starting point is a damp survey that identifies the real cause before anyone recommends a treatment. Our surveyors are CSSW and CSRT trained and cover Watford from our London and High Wycombe offices, so they see all four of these property types every week.