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You have what appears to be a terrible drywall/paint job. THe molding pulling away could be just sloppy installation problems. The roofers should not have bene walking around in the attic space, but they may have been. It could be movement from severe wind. Did you get Sandy?
Hm...it was gusty here, but not bad. I just had a few branches down. So maybe that's not it. Terrible paint job I can live with (I'm going to repaint anyway). Would hate for the molding to come crashing down on my nice new hardwood floor...but better that than anything more. That drywall is unfortunate, isn't it.
Former owner was an engineer, oddly...you should see my deck - it cantilevers out for two corners, got to get it fixed.
Persoanlly I owuld not worry about it. Fix it and see if it moves again/more. There is no sign of settlement or other problems. It deos nto look like the drywall is even seperating. If not, it is probably just a crummy installation job that is either failing or was always crummy. The crummy drywall installation kind of supports that theory
Can you take a close look and see if you see nail locations? I brad nail my trim about every 18" top and bottom. If not, then it is just poor installation. I have a friend that remodeled their kitchen. The old crown that was torn out was installed only with liquid nails. I suspect they did something like that to your house.
If you are sure that it was not nailed in place, get yourself a brad nailer and re-attach as I noted above. Then caulk the gaps and paint.
You have what appears to be a terrible drywall/paint job. THe molding pulling away could be just sloppy installation problems. The roofers should not have bene walking around in the attic space, but they may have been. It could be movement from severe wind. Did you get Sandy?
Absolutely, it appears to be an installation problem. Generally, when crown pulls away from the drywall, it hasn't been installed properly. The ceiling crack was curious and made me wonder if there wasn't some other problem here, but once you mentioned the roofers, it's clear why this happened.
You probably just had your heat on for the first time this season?
It's a pretty poor installation job (caulk is not a building material, and you have WAY TOO MUCH OF IT) and as the house has gone from the humidity of summer to the dryness of having the heat on, the cheap, too much caulk, has dried out. Chances are the crown was put up less with nails/brads and more with construction adhesive, and it is just suffering shrinkage and pulling away from the wall/ceiling. As pointed out, it probably hasn't helped having things 'disturbed' by the roofers.
Get a good carpenter to come in, reattach it properly, and move along.
Welcome to the (never ending) joys of home ownership.
I bought a house and settled in Jan. 2011. Actually moved in in May of that year. The house is a rancher built in 95 on MD's eastern shore. There was no issues with that while inspected and I didn't notice when I moved in, or even there for a week in March 2011. By November 2011 most crown towards the center of the house was separating from the ceiling up to 3/8 inch. Looked just like the pictures posted. It was caulked as well. Just like the OP I was getting nervous. My house has piers (I think that's what they are called) and the roof is supported from the outer walls which had no separation as well. A couple doors were also getting tight. I had heard that there can be some settling issues in this community, I guess due to sandy soil and was wondering if I needed to shim the 2 piers.
Spring came along and the gaps closed in and all doors are fine. Now Nov. has arrived and I just turned the heat on in the last 2 weeks. Guess what? Starting to see some gaps opening up in the crown again.
Is there something like a humidifier that I could get because perhaps it has something to do with the dryer air as someone mentioned. Or maybe a different temp setting. What is strange is that over the winter when I was buying the house it did not have this issue but the heat was kept in the low 50's just so nothing would freeze as nobody was in the house at the time.
Regardless of how well or bad it "may" have been installed, and several other guesstimations based on a few pictures that run the gambit from probable to totally absurd; what you have is shrinkage.
Not settling.
Houses with "settling" problems are foundation problems.
Shrinkage is simply a matter of removing moisture/ lowering the R/H in the house. It was standard fair in pretty much all the homes I built when approaching their one year anniversary.
All of this can be controlled to a certain extent with the addition of a central humidifier. Any qualified HVAC contractor can install one (as long as the furnace unit is in a space that isn't exposed to freezing temperatures).
This thread is SO helpful - thank you all - rep points on the way. I love city data.
OK I tried to check for nail locations but my stepladder doesn't get me up that high - tried to hold up a mirror and it seems there are few, if any. I'm guessing liquid nails and too much caulk as posted above. I did recently turn the heat on, and it's very dry in here - shrinkage!
So, this was all another intriguing surprise, but I'm glad the house isn't caving in (at least so far).
My inspector found other issues but when I had the inspection this wasn't happening - he definitely would have pointed it out. Grr. It was still pretty humid/hot at that time (early September).
I wonder what other surprises await. I should start a new thread about the deck - you'd get a kick out of it. It's like they didn't finish it and decided the stairs would provide enough support. That I knew about, will get that fixed soon.
I live in upstate S.C. During the colder months, separation occurs between the crown molding and the ceiling in some of the rooms, not all. During the warmer months, the separations come back together. Since
I bought the house in the summer, it wasn't noticeable. It still is upsetting and I'm not sure what to do about it.
Carol
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I suspect they did something like that to your house.
