Why Some Base­ment Water­proof­ing Com­pa­nies Don’t Repair Foun­da­tion Cracks

Mar 20, 2012 • By Matthew Stock.

Believe it or not, there are base­ment water­proof­ing com­pa­nies that won’t fix a foun­da­tion crack (as shown below). That’s right! It may be hard to believe, but they are out there. 

Over the years, I’ve heard just about every excuse in the book. Some of these might sound plau­si­ble to the untrained ear. Have no fear. Let’s unspin the spin together.

The Top 5 Excuses:

1. They don’t know any bet­ter. Some of the com­pa­nies in our area are water­proof­ing fran­chis­es who received train­ing from their East Coast fran­chisor. They were indoc­tri­nat­ed in the belief that every home requires a full base­ment sys­tem. Base­ment water­proof­ing out east is much dif­fer­ent than in Chica­go. The homes there tend to be old­er and built using mason­ry such as brick, stone or block. Mason­ry foun­da­tions usu­al­ly exhib­it seep­age through the mor­tar joints that hold the indi­vid­ual mason­ry units togeth­er. There are only two meth­ods for address­ing a mason­ry foun­da­tion leak: an Inte­ri­or Drain Tile or an Exte­ri­or Foun­da­tion Mem­brane / Drain Tile Sys­tem. While these sys­tems can be used to address wall cracks in poured con­crete foun­da­tions, most of the time it is overkill. 

2. They aren’t inter­est­ed in doing small jobs. This one always puz­zled me. If you want to be suc­cess­ful in the ser­vice busi­ness, you must be will­ing to do both large and small jobs. There are some con­trac­tors that just don’t think it’s worth the fuss. No won­der so many con­trac­tors con­tin­ue to go out of busi­ness. The cost to seal a crack is pret­ty min­i­mal; usu­al­ly it costs some­where in the $300 to $500 range, depend­ing on fac­tors such as the num­ber of cracks and depth of the foun­da­tion. Some com­pa­nies just can’t find a way to make this line of work prof­itable. It’s hard­er earn­ing a liv­ing when you have to trav­el a great dis­tance between jobs, espe­cial­ly with today’s gas prices! A more estab­lished, full-ser­vice water­proof­ing com­pa­ny can usu­al­ly group a num­ber of small jobs togeth­er in a tighter area to help make the route more prof­itable. 

3. They pre­fer a one-size-fits-all solu­tion like an Inte­ri­or Drain Tile Sys­tem as opposed to diag­nos­ing the actu­al prob­lem. That’s not to say that Inte­ri­or Drain Tile isn’t a viable solu­tion. Some­times it is As men­tioned above, it is one of the only solu­tions for a mason­ry foun­da­tion. Poured con­crete foun­da­tions, on the oth­er hand, have mul­ti­ple types of seep­age prob­lems. Some of the prob­lems can be more com­plex in nature, which requires a big invest­ment in train­ing. A top- notch water­proof­ing com­pa­ny should focus on offer­ing the most prac­ti­cal and eco­nom­i­cal solu­tion. That phi­los­o­phy has served us well over the years. 300,000 dry base­ments don’t come easy. 

4. They tried before and failed. Seal­ing foun­da­tion wall cracks is a spe­cial­ized trade. If fixed incor­rect­ly, they will even­tu­al­ly leak. Too many repeat ser­vice calls can over­whelm any com­pa­ny. Foun­da­tions can crack for a num­ber of dif­fer­ent rea­sons. In order to prop­er­ly repair a crack, you need to have a good under­stand­ing about what caused it. For instance, some cracks are a sign of a struc­tur­al prob­lem and they require a dif­fer­ent method of repair. Suc­cess­ful base­ment water­proofers also need to be well versed in both inte­ri­or and exte­ri­or crack repair meth­ods. Our aver­age installer has fixed thou­sands of cracks. We have sev­er­al tech­ni­cians who have been seal­ing cracks for over twen­ty years. At U.S. Water­proof­ing, you aren’t giv­en an oppor­tu­ni­ty to per­form repairs on your own until you’ve been men­tored by an expe­ri­enced Fore­man over hun­dreds of jobs. 

5. Their sales­man sees you as his next mort­gage pay­ment. Almost all base­ment water­proof­ing sales­peo­ple are com­pen­sat­ed by com­mis­sion. I’ll be the first to tell you there’s noth­ing wrong with that. Incen­tives are need­ed in order to recruit top tal­ent. That goes for just about any sales-relat­ed field. A line is crossed, how­ev­er, when a sales­per­son puts greed before a customer’s best inter­est. We pride our­selves on hir­ing sales­peo­ple based on their hon­esty and integri­ty. If they could have played Al Pacino’s, or worse, Alec Baldwin’s char­ac­ter in Glen­gar­ry Glen Ross there’s zero chance of land­ing a career with us. 

I know there are some expe­ri­enced base­ment water­proofers across the coun­try who would echo our thoughts. I’ve heard from some of you in the past and would love to hear from you again. Home­own­ers are also wel­come to share their stories!

Tags: foundation cracks, cracks in basement walls, foundation waterproofing, basement waterproofing facts, drain tile, researching companies, interior drain tile, exterior drain tile, how to choose a waterproofing company, interior foundation crack repair, exterior foundation crack repair, complaints

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