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Maintaining Your Home: 3 Tips for Preserving Your House’s Foundation

Author: Amitava Sarkar
by Amitava Sarkar
Posted: Apr 17, 2015

It’s been a long time coming, but you’ve finally earned the privilege of calling yourself a homeowner. After scrimping and saving for most of your adult life, you were able to build fantastic credit and obtain a home loan from a reputable bank. Sure, the house you purchased is rather old, but there’s no denying that the place has character – not to mention a fair amount of history behind it. If all goes according to plan, you and your family are going to be happy in this house for years to come.

However, moving into an older home comes with its fair share of annoyances. Since the structure is well over a century old, there are a number of repairs you’ll need to make. Worn-out floorboards, chipped paint and hole-laden walls are just a few of the problems you’ll have to contend with. To further complicate matters, the previous owner informed you that the structure’s foundation has proven problematic. Although some heavy-duty foundational repairs were made in the recent past, there are a number of measures you’ll need to take in order to preserve the home’s foundation for the foreseeable future.

Install a Functional Downspout

Excessive moisture is one of the chief causes of foundational degradation. Fortunately, it’s easily preventable – provided your home is equipped with a good downspout. When shopping around for a reliable downspout, limit your options to downspouts that extend five to 10 feet from your home. If you equip your house with a shorter downspout, all the water that flows out of it will essentially be poured onto the structure’s foundation. If money’s too tight to invest in a brand new downspout, look into purchasing downspout extenders. Extenders can easily be attached to most downspouts and can usually be purchased for under $50.

Space out Your Trees

Tree roots are notorious for seeping into foundations and subsequently weakening them. To combat this problem, make a point of planting any trees or shrubs at least five feet from the house. If any existing roots have already found their way into your home’s foundation, place a call to a highly-rated foundation repair service. The seasoned foundational experts employed by these services possess the skills and tools needed to remove the offending roots and ensure that they don’t cause problems in the future.

Carefully Monitor Hairline Cracks

If not carefully monitored, hairline cracks in foundational concrete can become substantially larger. Over time, this can result in a slanted and considerably weakened foundation. Luckily, you can nip this problem in the bud by keeping a watchful eye on your foundation’s hairline cracks and fill them accordingly. The next time you come across a minor crack, promptly clean it out and patch it with a foundational resin. Cracks too large to be patched with resin should be inspected by foundation repair specialists.

Buying an older home can be equal parts exciting and aggravating. Although moving into a home with a colorful history is fun, the plethora of repairs such a structure requires can often prove overwhelming. In order to keep your new home standing upright, remember to put the time-honored tenets of foundation maintenance into practice.

About the Author: Stephanie Belson is an Atlanta-based media consultant who recently purchased a home that was built over a century ago. After discovering several large cracks in her new house’s foundation, she enlisted the services of Atlas Piers, whose talented repairmen remedied the problem in a timely – and affordable – manner. If you live in the Atlanta Metro Area and need someone to repair your home foundation, place a call to Atlas Piers on the double.

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Author: Amitava Sarkar

Amitava Sarkar

Member since: Nov 27, 2014
Published articles: 349

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