House renovation in Batumi and Adjara: roof, facade, damp, services

Inspecting the house and listing defects

A house owner is responsible for everything at once: the roof, the facade, the foundations, the utility connections and surface water on the plot. That is why we start every house renovation in Batumi by walking round the whole house, even if only one room worries you. As with an apartment, we send a preliminary estimate from photos and a plan within 24 hours on business days. For a house it is rougher, and we work out the detailed estimate after the inspection. During the inspection the site foreman checks and photographs:

• Signs of leaks in the loft, the rafters, the metal roofing and the flashings where the roof meets pipes and walls
• Gutters and downpipes, and where water from the plot goes after a downpour
• Cracks and loose render on the facade, the joints around windows
• Damp, white efflorescence and a smell of mould in the plinth and basement
• The consumer unit (fuse box), wiring and earthing
• Pipes, water pressure, the septic tank or the sewer connection

The list shows what needs doing straight away and what can wait. It often makes sense to split the renovation into two phases: first the roof, gutters and drainage, then the finishing once the house no longer leaks. If you are not in Batumi, you can follow the inspection on a video call with the foreman.

House renovation in Batumi: dealing with rain and salt

We check the roof at the points where water gets in first: junctions with walls and chimneys, valleys, the ridge, the flashings over windows. Rainfall here is over 2,400 mm a year, and any gap in these places sooner or later shows up as a stain on a ceiling.

By the sea metal rusts faster, so we inspect the cut edges of the roof sheets and the fixings separately. We replace rusty screws with stainless or coated ones, otherwise leaks will start around them again.

Gutters must be able to cope with a downpour, and the water from them has to go into a storm drain or land drainage, away from the foundations. We repair facades with vapour-permeable materials. A damp wall under dense paint cannot let moisture out, so it comes through as stains inside the house.

Damp basement and plinth

Damp in a basement is treated according to its cause, and the causes vary. Water can come through the walls from the ground, rise from below, or settle as condensation on cold walls when warm, humid air gets into the basement.

If the water comes from outside, it is stopped with drainage and waterproofing on the ground side of the walls, which means digging out around the foundations. When that is not possible, for example in a townhouse with a shared wall, we waterproof from the inside. This is a compromise, and we discuss its limits before work begins.

New plaster won't cope with condensation: that needs ventilation and drying. In a basement used for storage, we fit mechanical extract ventilation or a dehumidifier that drains into the sewer. If there is an open-flue boiler, we fit extraction only after calculating the air supply.

Old wiring and building services

In a house where the wiring has not been replaced for decades, you find aluminium cable with no earth, old-style circuit breakers and twisted joints in junction boxes. The load has grown since then: air conditioners in each room, a water heater, a hob, a pump. We replace wiring like this completely, together with the consumer unit, RCDs and the earthing system.

If the supply capacity is not enough, it is increased through the network company, Energo-Pro Georgia. This is a separate procedure with its own timeline, so we settle the capacity question before any appliances are bought.

We check the water supply and drains all the way from the mains connection to the last tap. Old steel pipes are replaced, and the septic tank is inspected and, if needed, emptied or replaced. We install the water heater and pump where they can be reached for servicing.

A house on a slope and a house not lived in all year

Renovating a house on a slope costs more in labour. Scaffolding goes up on uneven ground, materials are carried up by hand or lifted by a truck-mounted crane, and an unpaved access road can be impassable after a downpour. We build all of this into the estimate and schedule from the start.

We look at retaining walls separately: cracks, any lean, whether water comes out of the drainage holes. If a wall holds up the ground under the house or a road, an engineer decides what to do with it.

A holiday home that is only lived in during summer stands empty and damp in winter. During the renovation we build in what protects it while the owners are away: a way to drain the water system for winter, a dehumidifier or an air conditioner with a drying mode, a ventilated underfloor space, and finishes that can handle moisture.

Detached house, townhouse, villa and timber house

A townhouse shares walls, and sometimes a roof, with its neighbours. We agree any work on shared parts with the neighbours before starting. The law allows noisy work in the daytime, from 08:00 to 23:00, but it is better to agree the hours separately with the neighbour on the other side of a shared wall.

In a humid climate, we check a timber house for rot from the bottom up: the lowest log courses, the floor joists, the beams over the basement. We treat the timber with preservative and fire retardant, and run wiring in timber walls in non-combustible conduit or on the wall surface.

With a villa or a large detached house, the scope easily grows into a full renovation: the roof, the facade, all the services, sometimes the pool and the grounds. We split this kind of renovation into phases, so that part of the house can still be used. If the work involves load-bearing walls, floor slabs or columns, design documentation and a permit come first, and adding a storey or an extension also starts with the paperwork.