What Are the Multiple Signs of Foundation Damage?

These are settlement fractures here’s another window we’ve got various cracks running off of here and then to this other side of the home as well

This is a little bit larger and this settlement crack is here as well so it’s broken there

In there we have another vertical break here and what this suggests and there’s another one right here as well so what this is suggesting because now they’re becoming more numerous and we can see where the rainwater is coming down off of this roof in landing right here

It looks like it may puddle a little bit but we live in Arizona hardly ever rains hardly anybody’s getting rain gutters but her footings are very shallow so when you let water gather next to a shallow foundation it’s like ten pound bowling ball on top of mud its just gonna go down causing these brakes

Seamless rain gutters with good downspouts to get it away from the home and an elevation change here bring up this dirt grate a little bit a lot more slope will solve this issue

Going around the other side so here we are over here and the first things that I notice is I’m standing at a higher elevation than that patio and that’s a large roof

If you calculate the length and width of this roof and this valley gutter coming down here that’s a lot of rainwater hitting this area so this side is moving from settlement

I should be able to see some evidence of that up here in the ceiling in the drywall at the construction joint and I do and that’s verifiable so it is stating that this is moving down a little bit and there could be interior floor cracks in that direction

So I get inside there it’s coming right off to this corner coming around going this way and this is a sporadic cracked fracture and it’s likely that this is a keyway joint running right through this wall that’s usually where the keyway joints is

The tongue and groove it’s like this inserted in the concrete slab and then it’s poured and that’s where it controls the joint

So based on this crack and the evidence on the outside over there on that side if this is moving down

We should be able to see a little bit of cracking in the drywall here and we do that’s been repaired and up above as well

Here the crack going up the side there too so that’s very verifiable

Over here in the front I’m recommending six inch aluminum seamless rain gutters for this entire house

Actually and anything to improve this grading over here to allow more water to flow out but if you capture it all off the roof and disperse it out from the house there’s a lot less water to be dispersed

Also oxidation of reinforcement steel right there is occurring so the repair would be from this entryway corner to the inside corner to this corner here

I didn’t see any issues here on this side going around the corner this is likely a hurricane strap that’s oxidizing causing this break over here it’s been painted over before

This is efflorescence salt deposit left behind from evaporated moisture and it creates bubbles on the interior side of the paint chewing into the concrete and then starts to delaminating the paint which it is here just paint below the soil moisture content will take care of that issue

Going over here into the garage here’s the floor fracture in the garage heading this direction it’s larger here and then starts getting smaller so at a 90 degree angle pointing this direction this side is going down so if this foundation is going down causing this heave crack here

There should be a crack in the ceiling and there is it’s all verifiable and over here this control joint is opening up which is suggesting it’s heaving upwards and this crack continuous goes right on to the interior floor

This corner exactly where an interior wall setting on top of an interior floor meets a perimeter wall setting on top of a perimeter footing they’re gonna get shearing

A crack is developed right up to here so that means this foundation is moving down and this wall the setting on top of the floor is holding more stable and you’ll see that shearing crack

It’s all verifiable for foundation settlement control the moisture you control the vertical movement of your home

Over here we have more oxidized rebar someone has patched this before it’s a vertical break right there’s likely an anchor bolt so the repair would be from this corner over to the other corner

Going in the backyard again and going over here on this side see a little bit different color paint here and there’s a construction joint where a window or something has been removed really don’t know what happened here at all but this is a construction joint where this crack is and this foundation moves any and all

This construction joint is going to continue to come open this would be very typical to a construction joint and the crack is a little bit larger over here on this side so I look for vertical breaks in the foundation

I only found one over here it’s very small very small right there so at least from here this way it broke and where it is going down just slightly and can cause cracks in the center construction joints here

That shows a little bit of movement in all homes are going to do some settlement of some sort over its history so again six inch aluminum seamless rain gutters with brackets to hold that gutter out level to capture maximum amount and you can’t put your water into your neighbor’s yard so you have to just wrap that around to your driveway and run it out that way