We live in an area that saw a lot of home building for about five years. We live on the bench, or lower side, of a mountain; that means that most of the homes in our neighborhood are built on hills or slightly sloping lots. Over the past few years, there has been a lot of moisture in the area, and some of the ground has shifted slightly. This has led to the need for foundation repair in many homes. In these cases, as in many cases where homes settle, it is difficult to know precisely where the fault of the settling and shifting lies. Regardless of fault, however, whenever homeowners in our area start noticing cracks in their basement floors that seem to be expanding, or whenever they notice that interior doors won’t stay open without a brace, they know that it is time to call in a specialist.
Foundation repair can only be carried out by a contractor who is licensed to complete this type of service. The contractor has to make an assessment of the specific homeowner’s problem before he can determine whether the foundation needs to be lifted with a pier system, or whether the process of slab jacking needs to be initiated. Both methods will raise the foundation to its proper level, but the choice of which method to use will depend on the case. Both services are expensive, but when a homeowner considers that the alternative is a house that might become unsafe to live in, the choice is not really negotiable.