Cracks on stucco walls
 

We just moved into the Villages and have a contract on house that is about 7 years old. It is in good condition but there are a few cracks in the stucco coming down from several windows, The inspector said this is not serious but they should be filled to prevent water from entering.

Anyone have an opinion on this?

Our first villa had quite a few of these and they were caulked and painted over within that first warranty year. Our second villa had less than the first. Our house inspector said the same that this is a normal occurrence.

Maybe D’Angelo Inspections will share their thoughts on this.

impo he's right stucco is a form of concrete albeit qw/o ( or very fine aggregate also there are no expansion contraction isolation jnts in villages stucco from what i've seen w/o those you get random cracking.a quik finger wipe w/clear 100%silicone sealant seals themalso !pretty certain frank will agree

Good morning folks! Just to be clear, we did not do the original posters home inspection...but yes, I would agree with what the inspector said.

IF they are the normal, typical hairline cracks they should be caulked with elastomeric stucco caulk. This can be found at Sherwin Williams and other stores of that type.

I would not recommend 100% silicone caulk only because it often cannot be painted over.....that type of caulk would cause a mess, as the paint would not adhere to it and it would look unsightly. The Elastomeric stucco caulk is the way to go. If you go to the store and just say stucco caulk they should know what to give you.

When we look at cracks, we look to see if there is evidence of any differential movement, if it gets wider at one end, if the crack views out in many directions, etc., etc. Those cracks are more serious. THEY ARE RARE.

If this house is 7 years old...it is time to have the house cleaned and prepped and caulked and painted. The original paint is the entry grade builders paint and it is near or past it's expected life. Your "new to you" house needs to be painted.

It is probably chalky. On a stucco home, the ONLY thing protecting your home from moisture intrusion is PAINT. After 7 years you have millions of micro cracks that you cannot even see. During a hurricane if you have TONS of rain buffeting your house for HOURS, the water WILL get through if you have old paint. It will get through the concrete and/or the concrete block and you will find the carpet wet along the wall. This is NOT a good thing.

4 years ago we had a hurricane go right over our houses. Two weeks prior to that event, I bought a 10 year old Premier home.......sadly with the original paint. I knew it needed new paint and it was on my "To do" list. Well, of course, I did not get to it within the first two weeks of ownership.

Along the east side of my home where the garage is and 2 guest bedrooms, a guest bath and an office the rain blasted that side of the home for hours. Suffice to say, I had water intrusion....never a good thing. The cool thing was that in the garage you can see the interior side of the concrete block....and you could clearly see where the water soaked through the mortar and tricked down to the garage floor...so this was also happening behind the drywall INSIDE the house. I have some good pictures of this. On top of that, we lost power, so I could not even use fans to dry things out. In the end, it all worked out, but I did paint the house with good quality paint, which still looks perfect today with zero cracks showing, even after 4 years.

Hope this helps!

Frank D'angelo

Frank

Many thanks for your detailed response.

Fred Gray

thanks! appreciate the warning about the 7 yr life of stucco.

meant to say the 7yr life of the PAINT.

if the pooper paint's used 1 can get more than 7yrs.......... eg - sher-wms 'loxon ' aquafin's great too !but much more expensive