I have the toughest and most educated drainage market in the world right here in Oregon.
As they say in New York; “If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere”. Take that to the bank. If you are looking for quality home drainage help on many levels, you have found it at AAA Home Drainage.
More expensive homes, as well as homeowners, usually also have more to lose. Therefore in general, the owners of these more expensive homes are my most frequent customers as the combination of knowledge and urgency colides.
This is true because of many factors in my opinion, not the least of which is their desire to learn, which is why they are where they are to begin with on the wheel of life, their knowledge level perhaps only given away by the stature of their homes and toys.
My home drainage market is a “niche market”, as a former Oregon governor homeowner I had the pleasure of working with said to me one day.
And it is a quickly expanding world wide “niche market”.
Only those who read about home drainage, as well as understand and apply what they have learned about french drains, can claim real groundwater prevention and removal success.
When a former governor gets referred to you, it is pretty much a sign that you have been recognized as an expert on the subject.
The nature of thinking “green” has been much worked, dissed, and spun in all forms, in media and press, both pro and con.
Todays expanding internet intelligence, in this case, as it pertains to the fragile world we live upon, which has drainage problems, being a water planet and all, has focused and mandated as a priority essential for the protection of our world.
Consequently, we must focus on what is best for our children. Not listen to stories of underground rivers and springs, set to scary music by sump pump installers, and their agents. Home inspectors are double agents. Fear them and listen to little they say about home drainage.
We can stop the drainage problems without their logic, trust me on that one folks.
Many home inspectors around the world, comprising varying intelligence levels on the subject of home drainage, as well as other aspects of what they postulate upon, get fat referral fees year after year, career after career, for funneling sump pump suggestions to their buddies, sump pump installers. This has been going on for as long as electricity has been around.
Sump pump installers get first chance to spin their stories almost every time.
Home inspectors should not postulate on home drainage requirements, as in the same breathe they tell the homeowners or prospective home buyers what they think is needed.
Home inspectors are not licensed, bonded and insured drainage contractors.
The stories of underground rivers and springs under your home being the cause of your groundwater collection in your crawl space of basement came from this fabled and storied river, spring, thing. Everyone has heard of it. It is infamous.
These stories of underground rivers and springs being the source of your groundwater are always told to homeowners and home buyers when the inspector is giving a home inspection report that he is getting paid to accomplish in a fair manner.
Home buyers most often are told a sump pump installation is a solution that stops groundwater entry, which is not the case.
This can amount to thousands of dollars in jobs per year, per inspector, times perhaps hundreds of bucks per referral. Work all funneled to their buddies the sump pump installers.
Many times too often around the world, home lenders play into this game as well, to facilitate control and to maximize their chance of closing that real estate escrow as fast as possible, while insuring that the buyers can no longer back out of the transaction due to undisclosed drainage problems, that were supposidly disclosed by the inspection report only days before the projected date for closing of escrow in the earnest money agreement, every time.
Lenders act as ignorant agents; silently facilitating their own priorities and ignoring the buyers earnest money rights totally in many cases, if not the majority of them, in my opinion.
This happens very, very often, to almost always. It is a given, if you are in the business of buying homes.
This happens when a home is in escrow so often it would shock you.
Home inspectors act as instigators giving glowing reports about drainage problems where no drainage problem even exists. I see it all the time.
What I make a living installing is “old school home drainage, enhanced”. Drainage for the 21st century with old world methods still used.
How bad do you want groundwater success? Quit resisting success then, while still expecting it to come by mixing a variety of drainage inspired findings that sound good to you, that are actually details derived from many illogical contractor sources on the subject of home drainage.
This method of study is usually not the most effective method for the serious reader with a drainage problem to solve, and is from a drainage solution stand point, illogical to support.
Don’t be a “sump chump.” Read this web site.
Have a professional home drainage contractor install 12″ wide, 8″-18″ deep, exposed river rock hand excavated french drains, located 18″ off the homes foundation wall, at the base of your previously installed and compacted/graded splash block also installed along your foundation wall at the time of your french drain installation, and in the area that corresponds to the leaking on the inside of the structure.
Cover the splash block area with a thin layer of river rock to match the french drain to prevent erosion over the years, which often amounts to decades with moderate removal of leaves and debris yearly by the homeowners. This prevents erosion for decades.
Over the last 25-30 years in America, city and county planning departments have been slowly moving to mandate, or at least suggest, french drains, usually not making a distinction between a ditch done with a machine and a hand excavated and engineered french drain installed by AAA Home Drainage in Portland, Oregon.
Cities and counties around the world have for years now been moving fast towards mandating and suggesting to developers, storm and groundwater water retention ponds and lakes to vent all groundwater and rain water run off from the proposed subdivision homes, yards, roofs and streets from hitting the storm sewer systems and often flushing the sanitary systems of older design and ability.
The level of the storm water retention pond, which is often sold as “the lake” to the lot buyers, goes up and down with each rain event. Perhaps even dry in the summer, full of tree sprouts.
Sometimes a storm retention pond can be located with a fine looking park and walking trails installed around it as well.
The groundwater perks into the earth in exactly the same manner that it does in your dry well, excavated in your yard.
Dry wells perk just like those storm water retention ponds.
So don’t let a sump pump installer, or anyone else for that matter, talk trash to you about how dry wells don’t perk, because there are literally thousands of these storm water retention ponds permitted and installed in the tri-county area alone, as well as hundreds of dry wells, all perking, installed by me alone in the same areas.
And every one perks or in rare cases, has been plumbed to collect and pump the groundwater away from the homes foundation with french drains, and then be pumped.
The groundwater is perked back into the soil by the use of a french drain, dry creek bed, or storm water retention pond or lake.
It doesn’t get “greener” than that folks.
The storm water retention pond is excavated with heavy duty land moving equipment on a commercial level, and sized to the estimated quantity of groundwater that the subdivision will be putting out from streets, storm sewers, and topography rain run off, as well as other sources of groundwater.
French drains in a subdivision like this will vent into a pipe provided at the curb sometimes, which can be accessed as storm sewer discharge, and vented to the storm water retention pond.
Hand excavated french drains, while ancient in basic design as aqua ducts with hard bottoms and straight sides that can not cave in, are also the preferred 21st century home drainage method for high dollar homes around the world everywhere from desert to mountains.
Hand excavated french drains last longer, and work where nothing else will. And they will do it over and over again, without electricity being restored in the middle of your night to stop the flooding of your basement or crawl space.
Homeowners cannot afford to lose any percentages of their home value, and especially not huge percentages of home value, due to groundwater problems, often created from fouled up home drainage work attempted by contractors, who on a world wide level profess groundwater or water proofing services, as judged by myself and peers, are well known to be notoriously poor to not successful at delivering groundwater removal results.
Most sump pump companies are about one thing, selling sump pump installations that do not stop the groundwater entry into the crawl space or basement.
Storm water retention ponds and dry wells are value added green nature areas, that bring in birds and critters, while enhancing the cosmetic home environment, as well as the street appeal of the home as well.
Green storm water removal saves ourselves, as well as our rivers and oceans.
The city of Portland, Oregon is presently installing a whole new huge underground storm water discharge system in many areas of the southeast, to prevent the storm sewers in that area, from overflowing the sanitary sewers during hard rains.
Homeowners in target areas of Portland that have rain drain discharges that are connected to the storm sewer at this time may be involuntarily disconnected from the storm sewer in SE Portland by the city.
The storm sewer system in certain areas floods the sanitary sewer systems, pushing human waste from homes into river and delta areas where pollution and damage occurs structurally and environmentally.
Contact Portland Oregon clean river rewards programs for details on reductions to your water bill as a result of using green groundwater disposal methods. Information on the Portland Clean river rewards program is available on this web site.