A Christchurch homeowner says she's not surprised that a third of EQC ordered foundation repairs don't meet minimum building standards.
The results were discovered in a survey of 90 homes carried out by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment.
The doors and windows at Ms Dalziel's house are not level. Photo: RNZ/Conan Young
Most of the problem repairs involved the controversial 'jack and pack' method where material is placed between piles and floor bearers to relevel homes thrown out of whack by the earthquakes.
Jennifer Dalziel is attending a public meeting in Christchurch tonight for those affected by the findings.
Her house has been subjected to the 'jack and pack' method twice, once just a few months after the February 2011 earthquake and again one year ago, to fix the botched job the first builder did.
Both repairs were managed by Fletcher EQR, the company EQC hired to oversee all repairs under $100,000.
The second repair job was carried out by another builder who said the first builder's work was illegal and would need to be redone, she says.
Ms Dalziel's foundations were 'jacked and packed' once more, including a number that had not been fixed on the first occasion, so that half the home's floor area was held up by repaired piles.
A year later, she said these repairs also failed, leaving her floor almost as unlevel as it was following the February 2011 earthquake.
While her bay villa was warm and dry, she was worried about what would happen when she attempted to sell a house where the internal doors did not open and close properly.
"If your floors are unlevel, that spells out to people huge problems. You know, whether it does spell out huge problems or not, it's perceived as being huge problems, so I don't want an unsaleable house."
The home is classed as TC3, or prone to liquefaction, and Ms Dalziel is now questioning whether jacking and packing her foundations is the right approach on land that could be too unstable to support her original piles.
Her land has yet to be tested to determine what sort of foundations might work best, something she says should happen before any more inadequate repairs are attempted.
In April she joined the 23,000 Cantabrians who have laid a formal complaint with EQC, in the hope of getting her repairs done properly once and for all.
She has yet to have it resolved.
