Crawl Space Waterproofing
Crawl space waterproofing is a great crawl space solution. What can this waterproofing do to help you solve your own crawl space problems?
Waterproofing Your Crawl Space Requires Custom Designed Products
Waterproofing isn’t easy in a crawl space, but it’s vital to protecting the integrity of your home’s structure, and combatting harmful moisture. Here’s what you need to know about crawl space waterproofing for your home.
What Does A Crawl Space Waterproofing System Look Like?
In many cases, waterproofing a crawl space means applying multiple repairs and preventative solutions that work together to ward off water and moisture. If you have a wet crawl space, here is a look at what crawl space solutions a Groundworks expert may suggest.
- CrawlDrain
AquaStop CrawlDrain is a type of interior drain system that is buried below the ground along the perimeter of the crawl space. It works to soak in the excess water or moisture from the soil in your crawlspace and drain it away from your home, to a safer area.
- Sump Pump
The AquaStop™ Sump Pump System is the most powerful crawl space sump pump on the market. It’s fitted to drain water away from your foundation. It is fully compatible with our complete crawl space vapor barrier system because of its unique lid.
- Drainage Matting
Drainage matting is a dimpled plastic matting that lies between the crawl space floor and crawl space liner. The raised dimples create a path and direct water towards a crawl space sump pump or drainage system.
- Dehumidifier
AquaStop Air System dehumidifiers remove excess moisture from the air in your crawlspace. When used with other waterproofing products, a dehumidifier can help dry out a musty, damp crawl space.
What Can Crawl Space Waterproofing Do for You?
- Avoid High Indoor Moisture
Many homeowners may have an out-of-sight, out-of-mind attitude about their crawl space, but it influences the rest of your home more than you might think. In reality, up to 50% of the air in a house can come from the crawl space.
If your crawl space is wet, humid, moldy, or smelly, it’s all going to find its way into your living areas. Waterproofing it can have a positive domino on the humidity levels and air health of the rest of your home.
- Reduce Your Chances of Foundation Damage
One of the biggest impacts of crawl space moisture is damage to your home’s structure. It’s very common for foundation damage to start with moisture, which means if you get rid of the moisture, you prevent foundational issues from escalating, and even becoming dangerous.
It’s possible to get rid of many of your foundation damage concerns just by waterproofing your crawl space. It not only strengthens your home against the elements, waterproofing can increase property value and restore peace of mind.
- Help Prevent Mold and Mildew
It’s common for mold and mildew to pop up anytime you have a lot of water in an area. Mold and mildew both typically thrive once a crawl space gets above about 70% humidity, although they can start to grow at a lower humidity percentage. If you’re interested in avoiding mold and mildew, one of the first things you need to do is reduce humidity.
Solutions that fit into your life
Why Might You Need to Invest in Crawl Space Waterproofing?
There are a few signs that may indicate crawl space waterproofing should be high on your list of needs. Here are a few of the things to look for when you’re considering crawl space waterproofing.
- Regular Flooding Problems
If your crawl space floods once, it will flood again. With constant flooding comes mold, dry rot, musty smells, and even structural damage. Crawlspace waterproofing actively works against these disasters that you can’t control.
By draining water out and away from your home, withdrawing moisture from the air, and many other solutions, your crawlspace can remain safely dry during a flood. You have other things to worry about during a flood. With help from the experts, your crawl space won’t be one of them.
- Condensation
If you have condensation on many of the surfaces in your crawl space, there may be a problem with your crawl space waterproofing procedures. Crawl space waterproofing should be something that helps you avoid all sorts of problems in your crawl space, and one of them is high humidity, which is where condensation comes from.
Even a small amount of condensation can be dangerous for your crawl space. Crawl spaces need a very small amount of moisture, ideally. If you have too much moisture, you can end up with serious problems, which include mold and mildew. Condensation is a sign of too much moisture, and you can reduce it with crawl space waterproofing.
- Dirt Crawl Space
Any crawl space that has a dirt floor needs waterproofing. Most commonly, these are crawl spaces that need the most work because dirt floors tend to have plenty of problems all by themselves. Dirt crawl spaces often have a variety of concerns, which may include dust, pests, and other problems.
Waterproofing in a dirt crawl space may look different from waterproofing in other crawl spaces. A dirt crawl space requires all sorts of additional fixes, which may include crawl space encapsulation, adding crawl space vent covers, and more.
FAQs About Crawl Space Waterproofing
After reading about so many different crawl space solutions, you may wonder which one is the right one for your needs. Trying to decide on the best crawl space solution is often difficult, but you can figure out what works best for you if you have a bit of information.
- Choosing More Obvious Solutions
In some situations, the right crawl space solution may be relatively easy to uncover. There are a few obvious choices, like the fact that a crawl space sump pump may be explicitly best for dealing with current standing water problems. It’s common to have certain fixes that you might be able to figure out on your own.
In these situations, you may be able to let an expert know what you’re looking for before they get to your home. They’ll consider your information as they inspect the area and formulate a customized fix. It might even help the expert to arrive at your home with all the tools they’ll need to fix the problem right away, without the need for extra visits.
- Getting an Expert’s Help with Less Obvious Solutions
Although there are some fairly obvious solutions that you might be able to put into play, some are a little more complicated. You might not know, for example, what’s causing your sunken floors. Instead, you probably just know the symptom you’re having problems with, which isn’t enough for most homeowners to figure out what’s going on.
The best way to determine the right option is to talk to an expert who can help you uncover the right answer. Experts know their way around a crawl space, which means it’s easier for them to understand what’s going on. Even if you just have a general understanding of the symptoms you’re experiencing, that can be enough once you get an expert’s help.
Even if the area in which you live tends to have very low levels of humidity, that doesn’t mean you’re completely out of the woods. Crawl space humidity has to do largely with the temperature in the area. Higher temperatures tend to have lower levels of humidity because air of a higher temperature can carry more moisture. However, crawl spaces are cooler than the rest of your home. That means even if you tend to live in an arid area, you should still consider your crawl space as having the potential for a high humidity percentage.
As tempting as it may be to just add a dehumidifier into your crawl space and skip the rest, it’s important to remember that a dehumidifier won’t fix the base problem. You have to fix the problem, not just assume that lowering the humidity in the area is enough. A dehumidifier in an area that has a constant flow of crawl space moisture will require a lot of energy and do a lot of work. Plus, it might not even work as well as you’re hoping it will.
The crawl space waterproofing process is so complex that it’s extremely difficult to do it on your own. You can do certain small things on your own and likely maintain your crawl space waterproofing process without additional expert help, but that doesn’t mean you can manage your waterproofing on your own. Instead, talk to a local crawl space repair expert. This type of expert can investigate your crawl space, give you more information about what’s going on, and make sure you understand what you can do to fix it.
Maintain Your Crawl Space Waterproofing for Better Home Health
Home health centers around a number of different elements. Considering everything in your home, from waterproofing to crawl space encapsulation to basement health and beyond, is what crawl space waterproofing is all about.
A Groundworks crawl space repair expert can help you with crawl space waterproofing from top to bottom. Don’t disregard what your crawl space is asking you for — reach out for help from experienced professionals to make sure your crawl space is as well-maintained as possible.