Inner North · Reservoir 3073
Restumping in Reservoir
Reservoir is the largest suburb in Darebin and most of it went up inside the same twenty-year window after the war. That means an unusual number of Reservoir houses have exactly the same subfloor, with exactly the same problem, arriving at exactly the same age: original 1950s and 60s concrete stumps on shallow pads, in clay that moves seasonally, now six or seven decades old.
Reservoir housing — what we are usually dealing with
The dominant Reservoir type is a single-storey weatherboard or brick-veneer home on a suspended timber floor, built between about 1950 and 1970 on a generous block. Where the inner-west suburbs fail by rot and the growth corridor fails by slab movement, Reservoir fails by settlement. The stumps themselves are usually intact concrete; it is the footings beneath them, shallow pads poured to a post-war budget, that sixty years of seasonal clay movement has worked down unevenly. The tell is a floor gone gradually out of level across a wide area rather than dipping sharply at one point.
The ground under Reservoir
Reservoir straddles the Edgars Creek and Merri Creek corridors on basalt-derived clay plains. Reactivity is moderate — not the extreme movement of the western basalt country, but more than enough to shift a shallow post-war pad footing through a hot summer. Properties nearest the creek reserves, and those with large established eucalypts close by, show the strongest seasonal effect.
What this means for your job
Access in Reservoir is as good as it gets in inner Melbourne — wide blocks, side driveways, room for a machine — and that keeps prices at the low end. The genuinely Reservoir-specific question is whether to restump at all. The suburb is under heavy subdivision and knock-down-rebuild pressure, and if the plan is to sell to a developer within a couple of years, a full restump is money spent on a house that will not survive. If the plan is to stay, or to sell to an owner-occupier who will commission a building inspection, it is worth doing properly. That is a decision better made before getting quotes than after.
What we see in Reservoir homes
- A floor gone gradually out of level across a wide area rather than dipping in one spot
- Doors sticking across several rooms at the same end of the house
- Stepped cracking through the mortar joints of brick veneer, usually near a corner
- Movement that is worst at the end of summer and partly recovers over winter
Restumping costs in Reservoir
$10,500 – $16,500 for a full restumpReservoir is typically the most affordable restump in the inner north — wide blocks and side access allow machine excavation on almost every job, and the houses themselves are modest in size. Deeper footings to get past tree-influenced clay movement are the main variation, adding roughly 15 to 25 per cent.
Indicative range only, based on typical jobs in this area. Access, soil conditions and the extent of movement change the number — a fixed price follows an on-site inspection.
The right service for Reservoir
Reservoir homes of this era have suspended timber floors on individual stumps, so restumping and reblocking is the service that applies — replacing failed stumps and re-levelling the floors above them. Read what the full job involves, including permits and the lifting process, on our restumping page.
Restumping in Reservoir — your questions
Should I restump, or just sell to a developer?
It is a real question in Reservoir and worth answering before you spend anything. If you are selling into a knock-down-rebuild market within a year or two, a full restump will not return what it costs — the land is the value and the buyer is not paying for your subfloor. If you are staying, or selling to an owner-occupier who will commission a building inspection, unresolved stump movement will surface in that report and get negotiated off the price anyway, usually for more than the repair would have cost. A quote costs nothing and gives you the number to make that comparison with.
Every house in my street looks the same — will they all need it?
Quite possibly, and that can work in your favour. Reservoir streets were often built by the same builder in the same year to the same detail, so when one house needs restumping the neighbours frequently do too. If two or three of you go in together, the mobilisation cost is shared across the jobs and the per-house price generally comes down. It is worth a conversation over the fence before you book anything in.
How long does a restump take on a Reservoir house?
For a typical single-storey home on a block with side access, most of the work is done inside two to three weeks, with the house jacked and re-levelled progressively rather than all at once. You can usually stay in the house, though there will be days when floors move slightly and internal doors need re-hanging afterwards. The bigger variable is not the stumps but the weather — the excavation stage does not go well in sustained rain.
We also work near Reservoir
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