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Can we talk about the time I learned about load bearing walls the hard way
I was helping a friend demo a wall in his old bungalow in Cincinnati, thinking it was just a partition. We got the drywall off and saw the top plate was sitting on a doubled-up 2x4 header. My buddy, who used to frame houses, walked in, took one look, and said 'you need to stop right now'. Turns out it was holding up the ceiling joists for the whole back half of the house. We had to put it all back together and call a structural engineer, which cost him over $800. Now I won't touch a wall without checking what's above it first. How do you guys figure out what's load bearing in an older house without plans?
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reese12421d ago
Man that's a scary story. I learned the hard way too, in my own fixer upper. What finally worked for me was going up in the attic with a flashlight. I looked to see which way the floor joists ran, then any wall down below that ran the same way was probably not load bearing. But if a wall ran the opposite direction, under those joists, it was likely holding them up. Did your buddy show you any tricks like that?
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