Million Dollar Moisture Magnets

I recently posted one of the many pictures I take, of brand new, leaky houses under construction in Auckland. Technically, they may not be 'leaky'. They're probably going to be much more airtight and water tight than something built ten or fifteen years ago. But that will just exacerbate the end result.

In my post, I stated that these houses are 'damaged goods' before the framing is even complete. And it's not just here in Auckland, New Zealand. I've snapped similar photos in Australia too.

The issue is that we have kiln dried, and in our case treated timber, sitting around getting wet. Some people say that because of the treatment, this is not an issue. The timber till dry out. The builder and then an inspector will check the moisture content of the wood before the lining goes on and everything will be fine.

But will it?

Will the timber really dry out? How deep and how accurate will the inspector's moisture measurements be? Has the damage already been done? And what happens to any excess treatment (often Chromated copper arsenate - CCA) that leaches out of the timber on site?

What's the Alternative?

A response to my post asked, "what's the alternative?" There are better ways to build.

One option my be to protect the site like we see (all too commonly) for re-cladding projects. Scaffolding is erected around the site which is then shrink-wrapped with white plastic to create a temporary enclosure. This is probably deemed too expensive for a typical build but I wonder if it could be more feasible if the total build time was much faster. Most buildings require scaffolding at some stage, whether it be for cladding or painting.

The best option though would be to build with wall sections that come to site already protected from the weather. This is not new. I've interviewed multiple builders doing just this in other parts of the world and people are starting to do it here too.

In Australia and New Zealand, modular prefabrication of this type is only just getting started. It's relatively small scale and bespoke. But the benefits of building this way are so great, that more of it is coming.

In the meantime, let's stop making our million dollar houses so wet before they're even finished.