Sloping Floors In Old House

Load bearing wall removed or altered on first floor.

Sloping floors in old house. Even seasonally some homes will experience floors slabs and foundations fluctuating in levelness caused by expansive soils. Older homes will generally have more sloping floors than newer ones. Learn more about expansive soils.

Slightly sloping floors which are common in older houses often worry homeowners who want to install new rigid floorings such as laminate ceramic tile or hardwood. Fixing a floor that slopes or slants jack up that portion of the house and place new footers. However if the second floor slopes along with the first floor then there could be a more serious structural cause such as foundation damage or settlement.

Sloped floors are common in older homes and even in homes as new as 15 to 30 years. Though a sloped floor might indeed bring some character to a house some of the issues that can cause them can lead to other problems down the road. If a load bearing wall is removed on the first floor then the second story floor joist or trusses may drop down in the area where the load bearing wall was removed.

Sloping floors are most often caused by normal and acceptable deflection bend in the wood joists which comprise the floor structure. After some time has passed take off the jack and re level it or stabilize it. So i would not try to fix that.

If you try to say level a floor that s sloped you may stretch a wire or break a pipe or something like that. I would work around it. Common reasons for sloping or sagging second story floors.

Anything involving 20 ton house jacks will take time. Many older homes have problems with sloping and sagging floors. If floor sloping is limited to the first story of the house that is there is no corresponding slope to the 2nd story floor then the reason could be missing support posts and damaged joists.