A house in my town had a full brick wall fail after just 18 months

I drove by a new build in Springfield last week and saw the entire front brick veneer was bulging out. I remembered it looked perfect when they finished it. The homeowner said they used a cheap, off-brand mortar mix from a big box store to save a few bucks. The mix wasn't rated for our freeze-thaw cycles and it just crumbled away behind the brick. Has anyone else seen a job fail that fast from bad mortar?

2 comments

2 Comments

noran2114d ago

That's a brutal way to learn a lesson. Seen similar stuff with those quick-set mortars on DIY projects. People use them for repointing old chimneys and it fails in one winter. The right mix costs maybe twenty bucks more for the whole job. Penny wise, pound foolish for sure.

seth_martinez2114d ago

Yeah, @noran21 is right about that quick-set stuff. Makes you wonder what else they cut corners on in a build like that, right?