Crawl space repair covers three separate jobs — sealing the ground so moisture stops rising, supporting the framing so the floor stops moving, and getting water out and air through. Most houses need one of the three, not all of them.
Which of the three crawl space jobs you actually have
Start with what you can observe, because the three jobs have different symptoms and only one of them is structural.
A floor that bounces, dips toward the middle of a room, or has developed a slope you can feel is a support problem. Something under it has dropped — a rotted post, a cracked pier, a girder pulling away from a joist — and the fix is new posts on new footings, not sheeting.
A crawl space that smells of earth, has damp or sagging insulation, or sits under floors that feel cold and clammy in a wet month is a moisture problem. Ground moisture is evaporating into the space and condensing on everything in it. A sealed vapor barrier is the fix and it is the cheapest of the three.
Standing water after rain is a water problem and it comes first. A barrier laid over water traps it, and posts set in wet ground are footings in mud. Find where the water arrives, stop it, then do the other two.
If you cannot tell which you have, that is a normal answer and it is what the inspection is for. What is not normal is a quote that proposes all three without anyone having been under the house.
What each foundation repair covers, and what it costs to get wrong
Crawl Space Vapor Barrier
Heavy sheeting laid over the crawl space floor and up the piers, sealed at the seams, so ground moisture stops evaporating into the space under the house. When the crawl space smells of earth after rain, when insulation is sagging or dark, or when floors above it feel cold and damp in a wet month.
What moves the price. The square footage of the floor, the headroom a crew has to work in, how much debris has to come out first, and whether the sheeting is sealed to the piers and walls or only laid loose.
When Crawl Space Vapor Barrier is the wrong answer. When standing water is already in the crawl space. A barrier over water traps it. Find where the water enters and stop that first, then lay the barrier over ground that is merely damp.
Crawl Space Jacks and Floor Supports
Adjustable steel posts set on new footings under the girders and joists, taking the sag out of a floor and holding the framing at a level it can keep. When a floor bounces underfoot, dips toward the middle of a room, or when a crawl space inspection finds a rotted post, a cracked pier or a girder that has dropped away from a joist.
What moves the price. How many posts the span needs, whether each one needs a poured footing under it, the headroom available to set them, and how much of the framing above has to be repaired before it will take the load.
When Crawl Space Jacks and Floor Supports is the wrong answer. When the sag is in the subfloor rather than the framing. A post under a sound girder will not flatten a floor whose sheathing has swollen or delaminated — that is a surface repair.
Crawl Space Drainage and Ventilation
Grading, a perimeter channel and a sump where the ground demands it, plus vents sized and placed so the space under the house exchanges air instead of holding it. When water stands in the crawl space after rain, when the vents are blocked or below grade, or when a barrier alone has not stopped the space from staying wet.
What moves the price. Whether water is arriving from the surface or from below, the run length of any channel, the headroom to dig in, and whether the discharge can run by gravity or needs a pump.
When Crawl Space Drainage and Ventilation is the wrong answer. When the crawl space is dry and the complaint is a cold floor. That is an insulation question, and adding ventilation to a dry space usually makes it worse in a Gulf Coast summer.
Get a foundation repair estimate in Houston
None of this can be priced from a description. Three things decide it. How many support points the house needs. How deep each one has to reach before it finds ground that does not move. How much of the work is indoors. All three are facts about an address, and none of them show up in a photograph. Send the address and what you are seeing. Someone who does this work in Houston takes it from there. If it turns out to be a smaller job than the one you came here for, that is worth hearing before anyone starts.
Houston Foundation Repair Co services.
Read what a Houston foundation repair job costs before calling anyone, and check the Houston Foundation Repair Co service area to see whether your street is covered.
Back to Houston Foundation Repair Co.
The ground under Houston
Questions people actually ask
Does a crawl space vapor barrier need to be sealed to the piers?
Yes, if it is going to do the job. Sheeting laid loose on the ground lets moisture around its edges and up the piers, which is most of the surface area in a crawl space. Sealed at the seams and run up the piers and the perimeter wall is the version that changes the humidity under a floor.
Should crawl space vents be open or closed in {city}?
It depends on whether the ground is sealed. Open vents in a Gulf Coast summer bring in air that is more humid than the crawl space, and it condenses on everything cool down there. A sealed ground barrier changes that calculation, which is why the barrier and the vent decision are made together rather than one at a time.
My floor bounces. Is that a foundation problem?
It is a framing or support problem, which is a different job from a slab repair and usually a smaller one. A bounce means the span between supports is too long for the load, or a support under it has failed. Both are fixed from inside the crawl space with posts and footings.
Can I put a barrier down if there is standing water under the house?
Not usefully. A barrier over standing water traps it, and the space stays wet with the problem hidden. Find where the water arrives, stop that, let the ground dry, then lay the barrier over ground that is merely damp.
How much headroom does a crew need to work down there?
Enough to move and to set a footing, which in practice means roughly 18 inches of clear space under the girders. Where a crawl space is tighter than that, part of the cost is digging out working room, and that belongs in a written estimate rather than turning up as an extra.
Ground that is saturated has nowhere to put the next storm, and water sitting against a wall keeps working on it.
What happens after you send an address
-
The address first, and only then who you are
The first screen asks for the property address and checks that a contractor covers it. Only if one does does it ask for a name, a phone number and an email — there is no point taking your details to tell you nobody serves your street.
-
Your details are not for sale
It goes to a foundation repair contractor working in Houston. The details are never sold, and never passed to a second firm.
-
No cost, and nothing attached
There is no fee for sending an address and no obligation that follows from it. Deciding the work is the wrong work is a perfectly good outcome.
-
Who does the work
An independent foundation repair contractor, not the publisher of this site. Who runs this site, and where every figure on it comes from, is set out on the about page.