Sticking Doors & Windows — A Warning Sign From Your Foundation
The short answer
Doors and windows that suddenly stick are often a sign of foundation movement. When a footing or stump drops, the frame goes out of square and the door or window binds in its opening. Seasonal humidity can also cause sticking, but sudden, worsening jamming usually points to the foundation.
A door that used to close fine and now jams is easy to dismiss. But when it happens suddenly, and other doors start doing the same, it is often the foundation talking. Here is how to tell.
How foundation movement jams a door
Doors and windows are hung square in square openings. When a footing or stump beneath one part of the house drops, the wall above it racks slightly out of square, and the opening distorts with it. The door then binds against the frame, usually at a top or bottom corner, and the gap around it becomes uneven. The same distortion cracks the plaster above the doorway.
Foundation movement or just the weather?
Timber doors do swell in humid weather and ease in dry weather, and that seasonal sticking comes and goes. Foundation-related sticking is different: it appears suddenly, gets worse rather than better, affects several doors on the same side of the house, and comes with other signs like cracks in walls when to worry and sloping floors. If the gap around the door is visibly uneven, suspect the foundation.
What to do about it
Planing the door only masks the cause while the movement continues. The lasting fix is to correct the foundation, whether that is restumping melbourne for a home on stumps or underpinning melbourne for one on footings. A free inspection will confirm which, and whether the movement is active.
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