What We Do to Help Prevent Settling

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Sinking can happen after fresh sod has been put down. We water soak and compact the soil with a tamper to prevent this, but sometimes the ground will still settle.  

Today, we're at one of our beautiful homes that's under construction to talk about how the ground around your foundation could sink or settle. 

But first here's how we start with excavating the basement. The CAT operator, after going through all of his calculations and carefully measuring the lots, will scoop by scoop remove dirt to complete the over-excavated basement. This means your basement will be 2-3 feet shorter than the hole itself; the extra space is used for water proofing and draining in order to prevent too much sinking. Later, that space is filled with loose dirt that is never quite as packed as the original dirt. Because of this, rain and snow melt can cause the sod or dirt above ground to sag or sink. 

To prevent these common problems, Charleston Homes does things a bit differently. We water soak the area to compress the ground; we manually probe the ground around the foundation with water to help the dirt settle. Another thing we're doing is back-filling and then packing the dirt down to make the loose dirt more compact. 

If you have any questions about settling foundations, or if you need real estate assistance of any kind, give us call or shoot us a quick email. We would love to hear from you!