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Colindale homes

Subsidence in Colindale homes and flats

Find out why flats and houses in Colindale move, from made ground under recent developments to older estate housing settling on London clay. Learn what a crack means and what happens when you ask for help.

Read about subsidence in Barnet

A 1930s style house with a bay window and a car parked outside.

What specialists do for Colindale homes

Each problem has its own fix. A specialist firm will look at the ground, the building and the damage before deciding what needs doing.

  • A row of two-storey brick terraced houses with colourful front doors and parked cars.

    Subsidence Help

    A structural engineer visits the home, measures the cracks and determines whether the movement is ongoing or happened years ago.

  • A black front door with tiled steps surrounded by wisteria on a brick cottage.

    Underpinning

    A foundation contractor excavates below the existing footings and pours new concrete to reach stable ground beneath the house.

  • Terraced houses with tree branches reaching close to their upper windows.

    Resin Injection

    A groundworks firm pumps expanding resin into the soil below the foundations to compact loose material and lift settled floors.

  • A stepped diagonal crack in a brick wall beside a window

    Concrete Cracking

    A repair specialist cuts out damaged sections of a floor slab, treats exposed reinforcement and fills the void with fresh concrete.

  • An open excavation pit beside a brick house wall with metal shuttering panels and soil.

    Screw Piling

    A piling contractor drives steel helical piles through fill material until they bite into firm strata far below the surface.

Local causes

Why Colindale homes develop cracks and movement

Much of Colindale was built on former aerodrome land and old brickfields. Fill material left behind shifts over time, so newer blocks and estate houses both settle unevenly.

London clay shrinks when it dries out. Trees planted along streets and in gardens pull moisture from the soil, causing the ground beneath nearby walls to drop.

Older drainage pipes fracture as the ground moves. Water escaping from a broken joint washes fine particles away, leaving a void that allows foundations to sink further.

New apartment buildings add weight to ground that was never loaded before. The extra pressure compresses layers of made ground, sometimes tilting structures within their first decade.

Resin injection tubes and hoses connected to a pump at a house foundation

Signs to watch for around your home

Movement leaves marks. Spotting them early means a specialist can read the pattern before the damage spreads further.

Diagonal cracks near openings
Cracks running at an angle from window or door corners often point to one side of the wall dropping lower than the other.
Sticking doors and windows
Frames distort when the wall around them shifts. A door that jams only in summer suggests seasonal clay shrinkage.
Gaps at skirting boards
Floors sinking away from walls leave a visible gap. In flats, this can signal problems with the concrete slab below.
Ripples in wallpaper
Plasterboard bends when the timber frame behind it twists. Creases appear without any obvious impact or damp patch.

Areas covered across the borough

Specialist firms take on work throughout the London Borough of Barnet. Each area has its own geology, so local knowledge matters when reading the signs.

If your street is not listed, send an enquiry anyway. Firms cover all of Barnet.

Tell someone about the problem at your home

Send details of what you have noticed. A specialist firm will review the information and arrange a visit if the signs point to subsidence. There is no obligation to proceed.

  • No cost to enquire
  • Local specialists only
  • No commitment required

What you send reaches one independent specialist handling subsidence in Barnet, and that specialist may pay us once your enquiry has been handed over. No charge falls to you from this website, quotations from other firms are yours to pursue, and our privacy notice goes further on what happens to the details you give.