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What determines the price of a new house or apartment to the end-user? If it’s not ‘what it's built of’, couldn’t more informed decision making at the time of purchase protect your investment in property better over time?

In the story of the three little pigs, the illustrations often denote an inferred difference in wealth between the brothers. The suited piggy in the house-of-bricks, the casually dressed piggy in the house-of-sticks, and the dungaree wearing piggy in the house-of-straw. Wikipedia also informs of versions where the difference is more character related, the ‘frivolity’ and ‘arrogance’ of those building out of sticks and straw versus the ‘practicality’ of the brick building pig. This story probably represents most people’s earliest lesson in ‘Resilience’ – the art of preparing by way of pre-planning, to survive both expected and unexpected challenges.

At a time when building methods and the building standards are very much in the spotlight the story is remarkably poignant – wolf related risks are one thing, but it’s worth thinking about what other risks Practical Pig (ref. Disney) mitigated by his material selection of brick.

Some recent fires in apartment blocks, schools and care-homes, all employing combustible structure building methods, are notable for the extent of fire spread and total loss of the building. A failure some might say, but the principal (and only) requirement of our building regulations, to ensure that evacuation occurred before the buildings collapsed, was met. The perceived failings observed fall into a number of categories. Firstly, there is a perception that building regulations within the UK seek to achieve more than ‘evacuation before collapse’ – they do not. There is such total divorce between life-safety and property / business protection that there are no requirements to even put the fire out, only ensure that in the race between the human trying to escape, and the fire trying to collapse the structure, the human wins – and they actually achieve this very well. Whilst active and passive measures may be used to ensure an appropriate outcome, the role of these systems is to ‘delay’ the spread and impact of fire, not actually to stop it (hence the rating of fire walls in terms of ‘minutes’ and the specification of sprinkler systems in terms of ‘water supply time’). To want an outcome any different, like having a viable building / business following the event requires entirely voluntary additional measures to be put in place.

The second perceived failing is that imperfection in the construction of these buildings contributed greatly to their ultimate destruction. This may well be the case and for many recent fires the press articles differ little aside from the name and location of the building – ‘fire stopping was absent or removed, poor workmanship, incomplete fire compartments, fire spread through combustible voids, a difficult scenario for fire services etc.’ All valid I’m sure but the overarching message is that some construction methods – principally those employing combustible materials in their structure, cladding, and insulation, in association with the design detailing that accompanies the method (combustible voids), exhibit a ‘susceptibility’ to these deviations from perfection. It’s appropriate to consider whether any building is actually built perfectly, but for some material configurations this might matter to a greater or lesser degree. Maybe inadvertently, Practical Pig, in selecting brick, also protected himself better against shortcomings in his own DIY capabilities in respect of fire.

The provision of new housing in huge numbers is a key government driver and it feels as though every city, town, and village is exchanging surrounding fields for new estates. Driving around it is interesting to note the different construction methods used – generally a feature of the construction firm whose name adorns the banners around the site. The homes are all beautiful and much needed, they will also be safe too, that should go without saying. But what about Resilience? – protection against the challenges of fire, flood, construction imperfection, and construction reputation (insurability / lendability)? In the UK we choose generally to buy our homes rather than rent and it will almost certainly be the largest capital investment we ever make. There is risk in doing this and the investment needs to be protected. Ideally it will survive well your occupation and remain an equally desirable investment for the next potential occupier. What determines the price of a house to the buyer appears not be what it’s made of, as the three-little-pigs story might suggest, but more ‘where it is’, and ‘how many bedrooms it has’. If that’s the case, is it not wisest to select a construction method that makes irrelevant to you the much-reported issues of construction imperfection, cladding type, building method reputation, extent of fire damage etc.? – why wouldn’t you if this protection comes at no additional cost?

If wolves were still a problem and the story were re-enacted today, perhaps it would be a rather dull tale of how three little pigs all survived a breathless and dizzy wolf in their brick homes – if there is no cost differentiation they might as well all go brick!

Dr Jim Glockling, Technical Director FPA and RISCAuthority

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