EIFSFACTS.ORG
The Real Facts About EIFS
- E-mail from the owners of a 10 1/2 y.o. EIFS home -
Dear Novashoc folks,
Thanks for all the work you are doing for EIFS homeowners.
I saw a question on your website about the integrity of EIFS homes 10 years or older. My home is 10 1/2 years old and I have gone from being a satisfied EIFS homeowner to being a very angry and dissatisfied EIFS homeowner.
I was a defender of EIFS for YEARS.. so proud of our dream home built in 1989 and its pretty cream colored DRYVIT exterior. Our utility bills were low and I loved the look of stucco. I even recommended EIFS to a brother who was considering purchasing a EIFS home in 1995 (in Wilmington, N.C. ). (That brother now has swarms of termites in his home and in his EIFS cladding and is having the EIFS ripped off his home this very week .. that's another not so happy EIFS story ... but back to my story).
Last spring a moisture inspection recorded 50s
across a large section of the front of our home. What had
happened after all these years? We have damn good windows (best
quality Andersen makes) and have meticulously kept up the
caulking (an unexpected expense for our "low maintenance
home"). Our
builder had experience with EIFS applications (having previously
built EIFS homes in Austin, Texas before coming to North
Carolina). Our home is not at the beach .. it is in Raleigh. The
company that installed the EIFS on our home was personally chosen
by us, the homeowners. (While we had no inkling of any inherent
defects in EIFS .. we had noticed some EIFS applications looked
better than others. We chose an EIFS installer whose previous
work we had inspected ... all trim work was straight and
perfectly beveled. There was an obvious attention to detail).
Back to what happened after all these years with a problem free EIFS home..... Unknown to us .. a 10 foot section of guttering had slipped ever so slightly so that it was draining water back onto a section of roof that meets with a vertical wall of stucco, rather than draining down the gutter down spout. The roof had been properly flashed at the junction where it meets with the wall.. but apparently the flashing failed with the extra water the slipped gutter was introducing at that point. We had to have a large section of stucco removed and that revealed rotted studs and soaked insulation. But the SCARY part was a wet second floor joist. A structural engineer had to come out and tell us whether or not the joist would be structurally sound (after it dried out). Thankfully .. he said the joist would be OK .. we caught the problem early enough. Otherwise, we would have had a VERY MAJOR repair bill. So a little slip in a section of guttering and with EIFS.. you could wind up with major structural damage to your home.
So now I want the EIFS off.. give me brick please. But I do not want to pay the $70,000 it will cost to replace the EIFS with brick. So we will wait and pray that the N.C. Class Action lawsuit will be a success and that we will receive a fair settlement.
I considered the drainable EIFS as a possible replacement alternative.. but with all the lies and cover-ups coming from the EIFS industry.. well using ANY type of EIFS would just be too risky.
Other EIFS complaints:
1) We can no longer get a termite guarantee. And yes now Dryvit has new installation instructions .. EIFS must be at least 8 inches above grade. Now that sounds like an easy repair .. maybe only a several thousand dollar repair bill. for the EIFS homeowner to absorb. But what about the extra cost of ripping 2 decks off the back of my house so the below grade EIFS can be replaced?? And what about the damage to mature shrubs and landscaping that such a repair will cause? And what about the cost of repainting my entire home so that the new foundation cladding will match the rest of the house? There's another 7 or 8 thousand out of my pocket ( to add to the $3000 I paid for the repair to the front of my home last spring).
2) Dryvit should have been required to take out
full page ads in all newspapers to tell homeowners about the new
requirements and possible problems with termites for those who
have EIFS at ground level. BUT NO.. they only quietly tell
builders about their updated installation instructions. Don't we
have any laws requiring full
disclosure of such things? What other new
"guidelines" has Dryvit adopted.. without
informing me .. the Dryvit homeowner.
3) I am now paying $500 or so a year for (annual) moisture inspections and recaulking of windows and doors. I guess this sort of offsets those low utility bills are touted by EIFS manufacturers???
Since our home is 10 1/2 years old now.. we have no legal recourse other than the Class Action law suit that our state (NC) has filed against Dryvit (and other EIFS manufacturers). Last I heard the trial is still set to begin October 4th in Johnston County. I'm wondering if local news teams will want homeowner's stories to highlight their coverage of the lawsuit. I certainly would be willing to tell my story..
Steve and Rebecca Perry
Raleigh, NC