5 Signs Your House Needs Restumping (and 3 That Look Like It But Aren't)

Not every crack in the wall means your stumps are shot. But some signs are dead giveaways that something is going wrong underneath your house. The trick is knowing which is which so you do not spend $15,000 fixing a problem that does not exist, or ignore a problem that gets worse every month.

Here are the five real warning signs, followed by three false alarms that look similar but mean something different.

The 5 Real Signs

1. Bouncy or Springy Floors

Walk across the middle of a room. If the floor bounces underfoot, like walking on a trampoline, that is a stump problem. What is happening is one or more stumps have dropped or rotted away, leaving the bearers and joists unsupported over a span that is too wide.

This is most obvious in hallways and the centre of large rooms. If you can feel the floor deflect when you walk, the stumps under that section have likely failed or are close to it.

2. Doors and Windows That Stick or Will Not Close

When stumps drop unevenly, the frame of your house twists. Doors that used to close smoothly start jamming at the top or dragging on the floor. Windows get hard to open or will not latch properly.

The key detail here: it happens gradually over weeks or months, not overnight. And it affects multiple doors or windows in the same area of the house, not just one.

If every door in your hallway has started sticking in the same season, that section of the house is dropping. One sticky door on its own could be something else (more on that below).

3. Visible Cracks in Plaster - Stair-Step Pattern

Cracks in internal plaster are common in older homes. The ones that point to stump failure have a specific pattern: they follow a stair-step line, usually running diagonally from the corner of a door or window frame toward the ceiling or floor.

These cracks happen because the wall is being pulled apart as one side of the house drops lower than the other. The stair-step follows the mortar joints in brick, or the weakest line in plaster sheeting.

Look for cracks wider than 2mm to 3mm. Hairline cracks under 1mm are usually cosmetic (see the false alarms section). Cracks you can fit a 5-cent coin into are telling you something structural is moving.

4. Gaps Between Walls and Floor

Stand in a room and look at where the skirting board meets the floor. If you can see daylight or a gap opening up, the floor is dropping away from the walls. This usually means the stumps under the floor are sinking while the walls (if they are on a different footing) are staying put.

This sign is most common in houses where the external walls sit on a strip footing (concrete around the perimeter) but the floor joists sit on timber stumps. The stumps fail, the floor drops, the walls stay. You end up with gaps that get wider over time.

Gaps of 5mm or more are worth investigating. Gaps over 10mm mean you should be getting quotes.

5. Sloping Floors - The Marble Test

This is the simplest test you can do at home. Put a marble or a tennis ball on the floor in different rooms. If it rolls consistently in one direction, your floor is sloping. That slope means the stumps on one side have dropped more than the other.

A small amount of slope is normal in older houses. If the marble rolls slowly over a long distance, that is probably within tolerance. If it picks up speed and rolls hard into the wall, you have a problem.

The 3 False Alarms

These three things look like stump problems but usually are not. Before you call a restumper, rule these out first.

False Alarm 1: Seasonal Door Sticking (Humidity)

Timber doors swell in humid weather and shrink in dry weather. If your doors stick in summer and free up in winter (or vice versa), that is moisture causing the timber to expand, not your stumps moving.

The giveaway: it happens every year at roughly the same time, and it reverses when the season changes. Stump failure does not reverse itself. Once a stump drops, it stays dropped.

If a door has always stuck a bit in February but works fine in July, it is a humidity issue. Sand the edge down slightly or wait for the weather to change. Do not rip up your stumps over it.

False Alarm 2: Hairline Cracks in the First Two Years

New houses and recently renovated houses develop small hairline cracks in the first 12 to 24 months. This is completely normal. It is called settlement cracking and it happens as the building materials dry out and the house adjusts to its own weight on the foundations.

These cracks are usually less than 1mm wide, appear around door and window frames, and stop growing after the first couple of years. They are cosmetic and can be filled with a bit of filler and paint.

False Alarm 3: Creaking Floors from Loose Boards

Creaking floorboards are annoying but they rarely mean your stumps are failing. Most floor creaks come from the boards themselves - they have shrunk slightly over time and now rub against each other or against the nails holding them down.

The difference between a creak and a bounce matters here. A creaking floor that feels solid underfoot is a floorboard issue. A floor that both creaks and bounces is a stump issue. If the floor feels firm when you stand on it but makes noise when you walk, the boards just need re-nailing or screwing down. A carpenter can fix that for $500 to $1,200 for a whole house.

When to Call a Restumper vs When to Wait

If you have spotted one or two of the real signs above, get a restumper to do a subfloor inspection. Most will do this for free as part of the quoting process. They will crawl underneath, check every stump, and tell you which ones have failed and which are still solid.

Call a restumper now if:

• You have two or more of the real signs happening at the same time
• Cracks are wider than 3mm and still growing
• Floors are visibly sloping (marble rolls fast)
• You are planning to sell in the next 12 months (a building inspection will flag it)

It is probably fine to wait if:

• You only have one minor sign (a single sticky door, small hairline cracks)
• The symptoms come and go with the seasons
• Your house is less than 20 years old with concrete stumps

When in doubt, the inspection is free. You lose nothing by having someone look. You can lose thousands by ignoring a problem that compounds over time.

What a Restumping Inspection Looks Like

A restumper will crawl under your house through the subfloor access hatch (usually in a cupboard or external wall). They check every stump by hand, tapping it, pushing it, looking for rot, cracking, or termite damage.

They will give you a report listing which stumps need replacing, which are borderline, and which are still solid. A good operator will also photograph the failed stumps so you can see the damage yourself.

Use our free restumping calculator to get a ballpark estimate before the inspection. That way you will know roughly what to expect when the quote comes in. For detailed pricing by state, check our 2026 restumping cost guide.