I inspected this home today with wood embeded in the foundation on the outside . backfill was placed over the wood and wood is on 16 centers . inside basement is finished so i don’t know if the wood goes all the way through . has any one seen this before?
I have seen wood in cement foundations before that was added as a siding nailer. That could be what you have here. If so, it shouldn’t be touching the dirt. But are you sure that’s wood? In the first picture it looks like cement to me. I’ve seen the wooden forms leave an indention in the cement that gave it a “grain” appearance.
It looks like there are screw heads visible.
Wood against the dirt is bad news, will decay. Hard to tell if it’s pressure treated variety.
Did the owner offer any insight ?
What part of the country are you in?
the grey is the wood weathered and yep nail heads. definately embeded wood not indentions from forms this is taken in laporte indiana .