Chris, are you talking about the foundation WALL that has a crack in it, or the cement floor that has cracks in it? Where about's in Canada are you looking at homes?
Cracks in the slab of the house (cement floor) are normal for Winnipeg and the surrounding areas because we get so much frost and things tend to heave. If the house is older and it has some small cracks in it...that's fantastic because if it's been there for a while it's settled and chances are small that the cracks will get any bigger. So cracks in the basement floor are normal for this area. Just make sure the cracks are no bigger then a quarter inch. Thin cracks are fine, bigger cracks not so much.
Now if you're talking the foundation wall...that's different. Any cracks in the wall could be very bad. But I'm guessing more that you're talking about the floor. The floors in basements are normally made floating so that even if it moves the rest of the house is good.
If you do buy the house, I would get an energy audit done afterwards, and they'll check the radon for you and tell you what you need to do if there is any radon coming through.
Otherwise yeah...what Xringer said...ask around about flooding.
|