Straight answers about wet basements, cracked foundations, and crawl spaces, from the family crew at 603 Basement Solutions in New Hampshire. Two to three minutes an episode. We teach instead of sell, and we will tell you when not to spend the money.
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A sump pump that keeps running usually means one of three things: a stuck float, a bad check valve, or a high water table doing its job. Here is how to tell which one you've got.
Water comes in around the bulkhead door every hard rain. Why it happens and what actually stops it.
Everyone asks why we fix wet basements from the inside instead of digging up the yard. Here's the honest answer.
That stuff on your basement wall is either salt or mold, and telling them apart tells you how worried to be.
Every New England winter, frozen ground pushes on your foundation. What that does and what to watch for.
Two ways to hold up a settling foundation. Which one fits your house, and why it comes down to soil.
Sticking doors, stair-step cracks, sloping floors. Which signs are cosmetic and which mean call somebody.
Old New England homes sit on stacked fieldstone. When the mortar goes, here's what it means and what it costs.
A dirt crawl space breathes moisture into your whole house. Why an ignored one rots the place from underneath.
Before you picture the movie room, here's what finishing a basement really includes, starting with staying dry.
You can't see, smell, or taste radon, and yes it's dangerous. The EPA calls it the second leading cause of lung cancer. Here's why it collects in basements, why New Hampshire homeowners should test, and what to do.
Radon is measured in pCi/L, and the EPA says fix a home at 4.0 or above. There's no truly safe level, but here's how to read your number and when to act.
A bowing basement wall means the soil outside is pushing harder than the wall can hold, and it won't straighten on its own. Caught early, we can usually stabilize it without tearing the wall out.
A failing lally column shows up as a sagging floor, a bowing beam, or rust eating the base of the post. It's the steel post holding up your floor losing the fight. Caught early it's a straightforward swap.
A floor that dips, bounces, or rolls a marble to one side is usually a structural problem, not a cosmetic one. In an old NH home it almost always traces back to the basement.
The sill is the wood that ties your house to its foundation. In old NH homes it was often untreated wood that was never built for our moisture, and it rots. Here's how to catch it.
A sump pump only handles water that already made it to the pit. A full system catches water at the floor wall joint before it ever spreads across your basement. The pump is one part, not the whole answer.
Both are fungus eating your framing. Wet rot needs a steady water source and stays put; dry rot is rarer and travels. Either way, the fix starts with drying the space out first.
In New Hampshire, any finished basement bedroom needs an egress window: 5.7 square feet of net clear opening, at least 24 inches tall and 20 wide, sill no higher than 44 inches. That one rule shapes the whole project.
A foundation issue on a house you love isn't a reason to walk by itself. It's a reason to get it looked at and price the repair into your offer. Most New England foundation problems are repairable.
