Independent inspection to AS 4349.1 by a registered building contractor. What you are buying, read by someone who has built. Report within 24 hours.
A pre-purchase building inspection in Maylands reads two things closely: the varied character homes of this river-peninsula suburb, and the ground they sit on. Wrapped on three sides by the Swan River, Maylands mixes Federation and interwar cottages and villas, plus art deco and newer riverside apartments, and the building inspection to AS 4349.1 weighs the structure against a river-flat setting that changes how these homes behave.
The river ground is the first structural factor. The low parts of the peninsula sit on alluvial river flats, and the suburb's brickmaking past points to the heavy, reactive clay beneath them, ground that swells and shrinks and moves footings with it. On those blocks the building inspection reads for the stepped cracking, cornice separation and out-of-level floors that reactive movement produces, checked with a digital level against AS 2870, and it reads the high water table for what it does to subfloors and, on newer homes, the slab edge.
The period homes are read in period terms. The Federation and interwar cottages and villas are solid or early cavity masonry, and the oldest, built before a damp-proof course, draw ground moisture up, which the high water table only feeds, so the building inspection assesses that damp for what it is doing to the brick and the plaster and the timber. Cracking is read for meaning against the shallow footings of the era and the clay below. Maylands' art deco stock is read on its own terms: rendered parapets that crack and detach and flat roofs and box gutters that pool, and steel-framed windows that rust and distort.
The apartments near the station and river bring strata into the structural picture, where the records matter as much as the walls, and the condition of the concrete and the balconies and the waterproofing is read against the minutes and any known defects.
Renovation runs through the older stock, and each addition is a junction the building inspection reads for structure, for the waterproofing of any retrofitted wet area, and for whether it was approved, because unapproved building passes to the buyer. The roof space takes the longest time, read for framing condition and water entry, and for past repair and the chemical delignification that turns up in the hardwood under the ageing tiles.
Because it reports to AS 4349.1, the building inspection excludes timber pests, and given the river's high water table and the mature gardens of the peninsula, the timber pest scope is well worth adding in the same visit. The building inspection's value here is reading a Maylands home and the river-flat ground beneath it together, because on the peninsula the two are closely tied.
We run the same inspection across the area, including nearby Bayswater and Ascot.
MISSING: phone number · Book online → · Flat $440 inc GST, report within 24 hours.
On the low-lying blocks, yes. They sit on alluvial river flats over reactive clay, with a high water table near the water. We read the footings for the movement clay produces and the subfloor and slab edge for the damp the water table pushes up, and where stormwater goes, because that ground shapes the structural picture.
On the Maylands flats it is. The suburb's brickmaking history points to the heavy clay under the low ground, and reactive clay moves footings as it wets and dries. We read for stepped cracking and cornice separation and floors out of level, checked with a digital level against AS 2870.
For meaning, not by counting. We separate cosmetic shrinkage from structural movement, read it against the shallow period footings and the reactive clay below, and account for any influence from the high water table. The pattern points to the cause.
A mix: Federation and interwar cottages and villas, plus art deco and newer riverside apartments. We read whichever it is, from the transitional damp-proofing of the old brick to the concrete of the apartment blocks.
It can be. The older Maylands homes were built without a damp-proof course, and the high water table gives that rising damp a ready source. We assess how high it reaches and separate it from a leak, because each is fixed differently.
Yes. We read the rendered parapets for cracking and detachment, the flat roofs and box gutters for pooling, and the steel-framed windows for rust and distortion, which are structural and weatherproofing questions a pitched-roof cottage does not have.
A read of the lot and common property against the strata records, with the condition of the concrete, balconies and waterproofing weighed against the minutes and any known defects or special levy.
A flat $440 including GST for the pre-purchase building inspection, or $616 including GST with the timber pest scope added in the same visit. The fee is the same in every suburb, and you have the report within 24 hours.
Given the high water table and the mature gardens of the peninsula, usually yes. The building inspection reports to AS 4349.1 and excludes pests, so the two scopes are commonly done together in the one visit.
Yes. A character home on river ground carries notes, and a clear building report separates the significant issue, footing movement on clay or subfloor damp, from the cosmetic, giving you a concrete basis to renegotiate.
Also available as a combined building and timber pest inspection in Maylands — both scopes in one visit to AS 4349.1 and AS 4349.3, one report within 24 hours.
Combined B&P inspection →Our office is at Suite 55, 15 Labouchere Road, South Perth WA 6151 — on the Swan River foreshore near the Perth Zoo.
Tell us about the property and what you need. We'll come back to you with a firm quote and a time.
PERTH