Why Your Basement Gets Wet: Improper Backfilling

When your basement starts to spring leaks like a sinking ship, it can be a scary and potentially expensive situation.

Many home owners mistakenly believe that simply slapping on some waterproofing paint or just running a dehumidifier will fix the problems. But, again, these are expensive mistakes because the longer the water remains present in your basement or foundation, the deeper the problems and the more costly they are to fix.

The problem more than likely began way back when you built your home or when the contractor put the house together. Building the house is about more than hammers and nails...it's also about dirt.

Yes, dirt. The dirt that was dug up to build your homes base...the basement and foundation...has to be put back in place very carefully and in the right way.

99.9% of the time, all of that dirt is just pushed in but not tamped down. When the dirt is allowed to settle on it's own, air pockets will develope. If you've ever heard the term "honey combing" of the soil, this is what it is.

All of those little pockets fill with water when it rains. They even begin to make little flows toward eachother, filling the pockets to capacity. This, combined with the clays in the soil and the varying tempertaures of most places in the United States, leads to the soil contracting and then expanding. This expansion pushes up against the walls and floor of your basement, putting tremendous pressure on the foundation and leading it to crack. Water can then easily penetrate the walls, weakening them and leading to the walls collapsing.

How can one fix this problem?

First, you need to get a basement waterproofing system put in. This can be costly, but if you fix the problem early, it is nothing compared to the cost of fixing a ruined foundation!

Waterproofing is not just some paint to put on your interior basement walls, as many companies would have you believe. You have to excavate the dirt around the home and re-fill it correctly plus make modifications to the outter walls so that the foundation will stay strong.

Your basement waterproofing contractor needs to re-fill the dirt correctly.

Backfilling should go quite slowly and measured. Each foot of soil added must be tamped by hand and by machine. These machines do a great job of compacting the dirt and stamping out any air pockets. This should be done all the way up until the soil is a good 4 - 6 inches above the grade. This is the best insurance against air pockets and pressure returning. A drainage system is also put in under all of the newly tamped soil to take water away from the home.

Then the interior walls are sealed with waterproofing paint and the home can remain dry and free of leaks and foundation problems. Unless all of this is done, the basement will eventually fall against the pressure that those small air pockets filled with water and mixed with clay put on the walls and floor. Once that happens, the repair bills are astronomical. And, in some cases, the home has to be condemed.

Once the back filling is corrected, then you can be assured that your basement will not have water issues anymore.