House Foundation Problems

If you live in an older home, you may not feel your house moving, but you can certainly hear it. It is one of those eerie creaking sounds, or popping sounds that echoes throughout the night. Actually it’s not your house moving, but your foundation dancing around on unstable soil. Most home builders place a bigger emphasis on beauty and cosmetics than foundation engineering. Why, because there is usually no problem until after about 10 years with a foundation, long after the statute of limitations for a law suit has run out.

Symptoms of foundation problems

If you have uneven or sloping floors, cracks in your masonry, cracks in moldings and floor tile, your doors and windows don’t open and shut properly, and the list goes on and on, then you are probably experiencing foundation problems. Even if you aren’t, this is a problem that you need to pay attention to and call in an expert for, as a safeguard. When I had these problems, the foundation repair company that I used placed sensors in every room in my house that had wiring connected to a computer, and then printed out exactly where and how much my house was settling.

Fortunately only one area of my house was settling, (about an inch) and it only took seven piers to achieve leveling, therefore my cost was close to the minimum charge of $1,500.00. This was several years ago and I have had no problems since.

I was advised by a structural engineer to install an irrigation system around the perimeter of my house to maintain moisture consistency. The differential of moisture from one area to another will cause the soil to expand and contract at a different rate putting undue stress on a foundation, especially one that is older than ten years.

Other articles on this site will help you in identifying foundation problems and how to prevent foundation failure. Most of the settlement problems originate at the perimeter, because it is the most susceptible to loss of or differential of moisture conditions. Also the original sub-straight soil could have had a higher amount of clay which is extremely expansive; however, this is not a major problem if there is no water puddling, and proper drainage away from the foundation is maintained.