If you’ve seen a few properties looking strangely elevated lately, it’s not just you.
Homes in Mandurah have been going up as a new technology is being used to raise them.
Locally-based home and property builders Great Living Homes have recently developed their own foundation-raising system, a process they hope will revolutionise home construction.
The company’s patented structural lifting system has been designed in the face of mounting pressure in the construction industry, including cost, time of delivery and space constraints.
Great Living Homes director Phil Jenner said the new system allowed the company to completely flip the book on house construction, especially with two-storey homes.
“Basically, it allows us to construct the second storey at ground level, raise it up, and then build the first storey,” he said.
“The lifting process takes about seven minutes, and then a day or two to lock in and secure the second storey.
“This is compared to the old process, where you would put in jacks, raise it a bit, then re-set. That would take about four or five days.”
The system is slightly hush-hush, patented and almost ready to hit the market.
Mr Jenner said the technology has multiple uses, from domestic building to emergency response.
“We basically started [developing] to meet the demands of the industry and time constraints,” he said.
“It means we can build storey upon storey without scaffolding, without incremental lifting and without the time and costs that go into that.
Also, since the house goes up much quicker, it saves the owner a ton in rent.”
On top of that, Mr Jenner sees the potential of the system in flood preparation.
“There’s thousands of homes over east that are prone to flood damage,” he said.
“After Cyclone Debbie went through, there was just thousands and thousands of houses left with flood damage, not to mention those ones that are still prone.
“This jacking system means houses can be remodelled without demolition.
Where the old technique would be to just flatten everything and start again, this gives us a lot more freedom to move.”
