I am scheduled to check out a leak at a 5 month old home tomorrow. The guy told me that the renters had to have the water squegeed out of the house, all of the carpet is ruined and the builder is telling them there is nothing wrong. They don’t have any clue as to where the water is coming from. I am assuming on of the lines in the slab burst and water is coming up there. anyone have any ideas.
If there is a sump pump check it too. I had a call very similar to yours and the sump pit was not full yet (but the sump pump was working hard) but water was coming up through cracks in the floor slab. A plumber with detection equipment may have to search for the leak. Just because the builder says nothing is wrong doesn’t mean anything. He’s covering his you-know-what.
I agree, leak detection equipment is the way to go, apparently the leak is not obvious if the floor covering has been removed.
Thanks for the info guys.
I am not a plumber so this sounds like a job I would have passed on to a plumber from the get go. Client calls and says “I got a water leak and need you to check it out”. What am I going to do? Go out there and say “yep, yous got you a water leak here, call a plumber. That’ll be $250.00. Thank you very much”.
Unless it is a friend or relative I think I would have passed the opportunity on directly to a licensed plumber.
I agree with John. We are doing a limited visual inspection of the property.
Licensed plumber would be a better bet.
The house is 5 months old and the investors wanted a full inspection. When I got to the house it was not a leak in the foundation. Water was seeping into the home from one of the walls. Using my moisture meter I found the location of what I would perceive as a leak in the wall. In addition to this problem the tenant demonstrated how he could pour a glass of water on the floor at the base of the wall inside the house and water would run to the outside of the house. Also if the exterior was sprayed with a hose water would come into the home. This was the case around the entire home. The builders representative came by and said moisture meters are garbage and do not provide any real evidence of anything at all. He also came to the conclusion that the condenstaion drain line(different wall) from the heat pump was the cullprit. He then ripped out the wall where the drain line ran and cut out a section and put a bucket in place to catch the water. Well the tenant decided to do a load of laundry and water began seeping from the wall where I had identified extremely highlevels of moisture with my worthless moisture meter. The builders highly skilled and knowledgeable rep said it was still a problem with the condensation drain line, and that was the only thing wrong. He wasn’t even concerned about the lack of seal between the interior and exterior of the home. Dare I mention that the grading around the house was neutral at best. The clients are happy and wan’t me to perform there inspections when they buy more homes in the area.
You may want to find someone who has a thermal imager to help you out with this problem. It’s one of the quickest ways to check for leaks.
I wrote up everything I found and told owner to hire the oppropriate professionals to conduct further investigations and repairs.
Turn off all the valves in the house.
Take a meter reading.
Take lunch.
Take another reading. If it moved, builder is wrong.
If it didn’t, I have a geologist from Ocala that will find it.