Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
KFI AM six forty. You're listening to Dean Sharp the
House Whisper on demand on the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Today.
Speaker 3 (00:08):
On the program, we are We're just working to keep
your home above ground.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
That's what we're after.
Speaker 3 (00:13):
Today we're talking foundation repair, and I have very special
guests in studio with me, a couple of colleagues from
the industry who are my go to guys when it
comes to foundation problems. Mark and James, the Foundation guys
from Foundation Repair LA. I say this, you've probably heard
me talk about them, or maybe you've heard like one
(00:33):
of the ads that I've done for them during the week,
But this is absolutely true. There's nobody I trust more
than these two guys when it comes to this kind
of thing, because there are believe it or not, there
are even issues when it comes to homes that are
outside of my wheelhouse, and I often have to call
in experts and listen to them. And when that happens,
they've got to be people I trust implicitly, not only
(00:56):
trust to solve the problem, but also trust to take
care of our clients properly and honestly with integrity. These
are the guys that I call in and so It
is a privilege to have you guys in studio with
me today answering these questions and kind of you know,
laying out as it were. I didn't mean to say
it this way, but a foundation for people to understand
(01:17):
what's wrong with their okay, foundations so perfectly Yeah, I
don't know. I don't know if that was perfectly said,
but there you go. There was all right. So we
talked all sorts of stuff. We've taken some calls on foundation.
Now want to turn to the solutions because that's a
mystery to a lot of people, right you try and imagine, oh,
(01:39):
these there's a company that's going to come in and
fix the foundation on your home, Like what does that
even mean?
Speaker 2 (01:46):
How is that? And I'm sure you know, I mean,
we know.
Speaker 3 (01:49):
That there are a bunch of different ways to approach
foundations because there are a bunch of different problems. But
what's a typical problem that you encounter and how do
you actually go about fixing it. I'll just let you
set one up and you know, hit it out of
the park. What what's maybe one of the most typical
residential foundation problems?
Speaker 4 (02:10):
Well, you know, we have to go out determine what
was the problem. I mean, that's what we've been talking
about earlier, is you know, we've now determined by walking
through the house, looking on underneath, looking around the property, what.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Needs to be done.
Speaker 4 (02:24):
And let's take a house that you know, take a
really old house, one hundred year old house. Concrete wasn't
so good, maybe even has rock foundation or you know,
gobblestone foundation, rick foundations. Those usually you're going right towards
a foundation replacement. That would be kind of typical on
a very old home, especially when the concrete's deteriorating. When
(02:47):
you can take your hand and rake it across the concrete,
that's pretty bad.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (02:53):
So now, as a designer, I'm going to cut you off, Mark,
because as a designer, I'm going to hit the mute
button on you right there.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
Oh god, I'm talking over you. That feels good?
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Yeah, no, flow No, as a designer, because you know,
I get called in to do restorations on century homes
all the time, and the concern is always how does
this home? How can we get this home livable in
the twenty first century? But please don't destroy its century
old quality and aesthetics, right, you know, I mean, we
did the historic camp house, which was a green and
(03:23):
green house right over here in Sierra Madre. It had
literally river rock stone foundation. That's what that's all it had.
It's a miracle that it survived as long as it
did before we got to it and actually retro and
we did foundation replacement. But my first concern when I
heard that word foundation, I'm like, oh, you're not We're
(03:46):
not taking the river rock out, are we?
Speaker 2 (03:47):
All right?
Speaker 3 (03:48):
It didn't have to happen that way, because what happened
was crawled under there and sistered a brand new foundation
next to it on the back side of it where
nobody could see, and now it's as strong as the
other house in the area. So I just wanted to say,
because that's a concern that people have when we talk
about foundation replacement, So what does that mean to you
(04:10):
foundation replacement?
Speaker 4 (04:12):
Well, on that case, we would have evaluated the rock,
the river rock foundation to be worthy of keeping. Okay,
if the rocks are rolling out in the driveway and
rolling underneath the house, probably no point really it's saving that.
But you can do if the rock is good, you
would save it, and you do the sister, And that's
what you guys did on that project, So that was
(04:33):
a perfect solution for it. The sister foundation is a
brand new rebar reinforced, deepened foundation bolted to the house
that does the exact same thing as removing everything.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
That's a sister founding. It's sitting on the inside.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
It's sitting on the inside of the old foundation, and
essentially now that at that house, the camp house, the
river rock, the old river rock foundation is just a
decorative veneer exactly sitting on the outside the house. So
it hasn't lost its look, but it's not bearing the
load anymore.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
That's right now.
Speaker 4 (05:04):
In the way I started to mention, I mean, if
the rocks are all falling out and the mortar is
gone that held the rock in place, will build the
foundation in set and just plaster the rock back on
the face. That's another way you can to restore it. Literally,
have saved the rocks, okay, and reuse them. You can
do the same thing on the brick. The brick house
(05:25):
normally would do a sister foundation if the bricker's worth savings.
Now sometimes you'll have a brick or rock foundation you
can't even see. It's covered by sighting landscape that's up
up against it. It's not a visible component. Well, then
at that point there's really no point in saving the
rock and stuff like you just replace it.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
It's not doing its job, so it doesn't have an
aesthetic quality. Then at that time it doesn't. Yeah, yeah,
but the asthetic quality you definitely want to save, all right.
Part So all right, so that's a new foundation. That's great.
When we found a century old home that just has
a completely inadequate foundation. What if something is broken or sagging.
(06:04):
What if there's a floor way out of level, James,
what do we do then? Do you guys just go
in with your hands and lift it up and then
somebody shoves some things underneath or what?
Speaker 2 (06:12):
How does that work? Not quite? Okay?
Speaker 5 (06:14):
So so really we're getting onto the subject of settlement.
You know, movement. There's two aspects to correcting that. One
is the structural end of it. How do we get
it to stop moving so it doesn't move again? Okay,
you always want to do that first.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
Obviously.
Speaker 5 (06:28):
The second part of that would be the cosmetic end.
That's where we would jack it up, not with our hands.
We do use hydraulic jacks and other equipment and you
would lift it up and that would address the cosmetic
portion of the job. When it comes to a slab,
you can either remove and replace the slab, or you
(06:49):
can underpin it stop it from settling, and then you
can pour on top of it the self leveling layer.
But again, it's you know, it's into you've got structural
so the extent that it has settled, the geology around it,
whether it's on a hillside or not, how old it is,
those are things that are going to determine how do
(07:11):
we structurally repair it. Do we just replace the foundation
in that area? Do we underpin it? You know, underpinning
is putting a deeper foundation in underneath the existing Do we.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
Go full bore soils report.
Speaker 5 (07:25):
You know, casons or friction piles. All right, so we're
gonna that's that's deep water. We're gonna get into that. Okay,
I want to come back to that right after the break. Yep, Okay,
underpinning casons. Oh, the word cason, people just their hearts
drop if they actually know what a cason is. They're like,
oh no, that's like sixty feet deep, right, and to
(07:45):
cost eight hundred thousand dollars.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
No, not quite, okay, all right, all right, all right,
we'll clear that up. Okay.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
On the other side of the break your Home with
Dean Sharp, the house Whisper.
Speaker 6 (07:55):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI A M six forty A pleasure.
Speaker 3 (08:01):
It is an honor to spend time with you on
a Sunday morning talking about this all important thing to
all of us, your home. And today we're talking about
the very foundation of your home, foundation repair work, and
I'm doing with my special in studio guests Mark and James,
the Foundation guys from Foundation Repair LA. All right before
(08:23):
the break. Now we're talking about things that you guys
do to fix and repair things. Some of the techniques
that you use are some of the approaches that you take.
And James, before I get into the Kson question, I
just want to clarify when when you say that you
know a sagging foundation sloping foundation on a house, when
(08:43):
you say underpinning, that means you know, digging underneath the
existing footings that are there and creating a larger, more
substantial pad to stop the sloping to First of all,
you stop, like you said, Mark, you stop the problem
from going any further. But then that still leaves us
with something that's at a level. Either the stem wall
is at a level, the slab is out of level.
(09:04):
But I wanted to make sure our listeners understand, well,
when you talk about jacking up a house, after that,
you're talking about a raised foundation house that we've stopped
the concrete from sloping any further. And in a raise
foundation situation, we can get jacks underneath the house and
get them on the wood, the floor joists themselves and
(09:25):
actually get that thing level again. And then you know,
I don't want to use the word shim as if
it's a little but basically then infill between and stabilize
the house. But that's you're not talking about a slab situation,
right correct? Okay, yeah, so raise foundations are much easier
to lift. I mean, you're not going to really be
able to lift a concrete slab without breaking it causing
(09:47):
further issues. And then you leave, you would leave a
void underneath it if you were to lift it, right,
so the slab stays where it is now. Unless so
you got two situations. What if I've got a slab
that's pretty much intact, but it has just kind of
broken at one line and the whole thing is kind
of sloped.
Speaker 5 (10:03):
You can top that with a self leveling cement. The
slab does have to be in good enough shape for
that to hold together. You could replace the slab and
pour it level. We can lift the wood frame wall
off of the slab to that extent. Then you end
up with a nice level ceiling as well. See, you
(10:24):
have options. I mean it depends on you know, the
client's budget and how bad the problem is. What do
they want to do with it. Sometimes it's not bad
enough to go full bore, replace the slab, lift the
framing off of it.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
Right.
Speaker 3 (10:37):
So again, it can go all the way from just
cosmetic on the inside to unbolting the walls and lifting
them up and getting a new slab poured underneath it
for that section. Yep, so and everything and anything in between. Sure,
depending on how far they want to go. Mark, you
were talking about bolting a house. Yes, what are we
talking about bolting a house?
Speaker 4 (10:58):
Well? We always you know, you hear the bolting term.
I have a bolt and I need to bolt my
house or seismic retrofit. This is earthquake retrofitting right.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Like Brason Bolt.
Speaker 4 (11:07):
Brayson Bolt is a California's program. So bolting is what
we know most people know about, but there's actually three
major components. Bolting is one of them. The next two
components have to do with the rest of the type
of foundation. On a raised foundation, you might have what
we call cripple walls kind of a politically incorrect term
(11:31):
now but short wood walls. So you have the concrete foundation,
then a wooden wall that goes up to the floor
and it might be varying heights that has to be reinforced.
I always use the analogy like a house of cards.
You could everybody knows about a house of cards. You
can build a house of cards, put a card on top,
and it's very you know, it's kind of amazing. You
can have these playing cards hold up that flat piece
(11:53):
of card. But you know, if I'm going to push
on one side, it's just a tip over. Cripple walls
are very weak that they're just a bunch of wooden
studs would two by fours typically, and they need to
be reinforced with plywood.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
So that's a second component.
Speaker 3 (12:08):
So they have to be turned into essentially a kind
of shear wall or sheer resistant wall that can resist
the lateral force, not the downforce. They're doing just fine
with the dead load weight, but the lateral forces on
that wall that would keep it from falling over.
Speaker 4 (12:22):
Right, So that's the second main component. Now, many houses
don't have cripple walls. Concrete goes all the way up
to the floor, so that component wouldn't be done. But
if you have cripple walls, they are particularly susceptible to
earthquake damage. And then there's the third component, which both
houses with cripple walls and without cripple walls, is tying
the floors to what got bolted. So you actually tie
(12:46):
the floor joists get tied to the wooden sill plate
or bottom plate that got bolted to the concrete, so
that it's a complete connection from the floor to the
concrete and just spends what kind of foundation have now,
slab houses, slab foundations, you don't retrofit. They don't have
that intermediate crawl space section. They have a different kind
(13:08):
of component, and they're usually bolted. Sometimes they're nailed to
the concrete.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
Yeah. Yeah, so that's not the same level of concern.
Speaker 4 (13:17):
No, you don't have there's not this extra component. When
you have a raised foundation, you have this extra component.
Slab foundations. They're sitting on the ground already. They're already
on the ground where a raised foundations not. And that's
why the programs that are out there is for these
bolting programs, it's actually a retrofit those three components.
Speaker 3 (13:36):
Right now, you guys, we're talking during the break, You guys,
I love the fact that you guys approach these solutions
as practically as you do. You're talking about the idea
like an older home that's a raised foundation house could
be settling. The whole outside perimeter foundation could be sinking
down evenly, but sinking down into the soil after a
(13:57):
century or so. But the center, like where the little
California basement, it's not sinking at all.
Speaker 5 (14:03):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
And so the middle of the house is not sinking.
The outside of the house has sunk down, but it's
sunk down relatively evenly. Your approach might be, you know,
why jack up the entire outside of the foundation. We'll
just lower the middle part of the house to get
it even because the goal is flat.
Speaker 4 (14:20):
Right. Yes, So it's a very simple solution to the problem.
And it says, hey, it took seventy five years or
eighty years to sink around the perimeter, and you now
got a hump in the middle of the house. And
what I'm gonna lift the whole house just to handle
this hump. Why don't I just lower it? And it's
now all a level and all I mean, And we
won't have that problem for another fifty years. Fifty years,
(14:42):
you know, and we'll look at it again.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
All right, there you go. All right, I got more
questions for you.
Speaker 3 (14:46):
We're going to do it on the other side of
the break your Home with Dean Sharp, the house whisper.
Speaker 6 (14:51):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six.
Speaker 3 (14:56):
Forty, and we are getting it done today. We're talking
Foundation with my special in studio guest Mark and James
from Foundation Repair LA. It's been a fascinating conversation so far.
Lots of good information going out there. Let's talk about
the C word caissons. Okay, I wasn't sure where that
(15:17):
was going on there, Dean. They both looked at me like,
what are you doing? This is the family show Hillside House,
Hillside Repairs, and we're not talking about repairing the hillside.
We're talking about repairing the house. If we got a
hillside house it's starting to slip casson. I mean, that's
pretty much where we're at. Sometimes there is no other solution.
(15:41):
You will run into circumstances when you know the hillside
is steep enough or there's been enough settlement. There just
isn't another solution that's gonna work. All right, Explain what
a cason is. A cason is essentially a drilled shaft
that is filled with reinforcing bars steel rebar and then
filled with concrete. And that's what your house sits on.
(16:02):
You mentioned earlier sixty feet deep. A lot of times
they're not anywhere near that deep. They can be I
was exaggerating, Okay. I also said they cost eight hundred
thousand dollars. They don't usually, but they can't. Oh geez,
you didn't have to say that. I think very rarely,
very rarely.
Speaker 5 (16:20):
But if you take one of these thirty thousand square
foot you know mansions in Malibu that's new construction, they
could be doing.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
Something like that.
Speaker 5 (16:27):
Well, sure, but that's not we're not doing new construction.
So no, Typically, if the house is on enough of
the hillside or the soul's conditions are poor enough, and
we need a geological report, and we have to go
down to a better strata of material. I eat bedrock
or you know, whatever the soul's engineer recommends on that
particular project. A lot of times they'll be fifteen feet
(16:49):
deep or twenty feet deep. But it's an effective way
to stop movement on a hillside where nothing else will work.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
Right.
Speaker 3 (16:57):
A lot of people look at hillside houses and they're like, oh,
no way, that's crazy. You know, the house built up
on stilts. But if those stilts are anchored into a
cason that is actually sitting on down at the bottom,
sitting on bedrock, that house has got a foundation that
will outlast you know, many of the ones that are
sitting out in the flats, you know, just because I
(17:20):
mean it's on bedrock, it's on roy has a hillside house.
So sitting on bedrock, that's the goal of the case
on to reach firmer material so it doesn't slide. And
sometimes it's just necessary.
Speaker 4 (17:34):
It's also what's important too, is it is the cheapest
way to support the house at that in that kind
of condition. The other alternative is what you can excavate
the whole mountain side and pour a whole concrete foundation
thirty feet deep to get to good material all the
way around house. That's prohibited. You can't do that. So
the caseon, actually it's kind of a misnomer. You think
(17:57):
it's bad. It's actually a solution to the prom and
it's an economical solution. They may be twenty feet apart
or fifteen feet apart between the next case on, So
you're distributing load over a vast area going deep, and
there is no other alternative.
Speaker 2 (18:16):
To get a lot of bang for the buck in
the right situation. Exactly what do you.
Speaker 3 (18:19):
Guys do when a Okay, so let's let's talk about
retaining walls. Now, what if I got to retain a
real retap I'm not talking about a garden wall. And
people should know the difference. Okay, if you've got a
block wall in between you and your neighbor, Okay, and
you look over the other side, you're standing there, and
your neighbor's standing there, and he's not higher up than you.
(18:40):
You're both just standing on the same plant. That's just
a fence made out of block wall, correct, made out
of cinder block. Right, A retaining wall is holding back
over three feet of vertical material. It's actually retaining soil.
What if I've got a retaining wall that's starting to
roll over start, you know, it's leaning leaning in obviously
from the pressure of the soil.
Speaker 2 (18:59):
You guys, deal, what do you do with that?
Speaker 5 (19:02):
Well?
Speaker 2 (19:03):
How much leaning are we talking? Oh?
Speaker 5 (19:05):
How much leaning would you like me to talk about? Well,
I mean a rule of thumb is ten percent.
Speaker 2 (19:10):
Okay.
Speaker 5 (19:10):
You know, if you have a wall that's six feet
tall seventy two inches about seven inches out of plumb,
you're typically going to consider that failed.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
Okay, let's say that's what I've got. Let's say I'm
let drop a plumb line down. I'm like, wow, that
thing is it's six or seven inches out from top
to bottom.
Speaker 2 (19:27):
Six foot wall.
Speaker 5 (19:28):
So I mean you'd be looking at either putting a
new wall in front of it, generally or replacing it.
If you catch it early enough, you can do things
like subdrains behind it manage the water flow, but swales
in things that are going to you know, minimize and
if it does happen, release hydrostatic pressure from behind the wall.
If you can get it early enough, you know, you
(19:48):
may be able to save it. But typically once it's
once that wall is rotating, it's it's heading towards the
end of its life.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
So you guys are going to come inside that wall
you can you can do that or you replace it.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
It really depends on the damage.
Speaker 3 (20:05):
If I pull that wall, I mean we're talking about
replacing it, how do you shore up the do you
have to excavate the backside of it to keep it
from you know, because I can't just pull the wall
out and then the hillside comes into my yard.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Yeah, you have to cut back.
Speaker 4 (20:18):
And if it's on a property line, it's going to
affect your neighbors as well. And then another consideration is
the landscaping. You know, maybe it's lined with trees, So
now we've got to consider the trees. So again it's
going to be every condition is going to have to
be looked at, each site looked at, maybe a different solution.
Speaker 3 (20:36):
Speaking of trees, let's say I've got a retaining wall
like running along my back slope. You know, I've got
one of those houses that's got to slope up, you know,
backslope coming out of the rear yard, tree up on
the slope. Okay, most of the wall end to end,
it's in good shape, but clearly from root action or something.
(20:57):
Now the middle of the wall's bulging out, the whole wall,
just the middle.
Speaker 2 (21:01):
What do we do with that? Could replace it?
Speaker 5 (21:03):
Section of it? Good sister, A section of it. It's
you know, it's difficult to say without seeing it. What's
the exact circumstance, How tall is it?
Speaker 2 (21:15):
How long?
Speaker 3 (21:15):
I just want you to solve all my problems sight unseen, James.
I just clearly that's what I'm asking for here. I'm
just saying, like, don't worry, Dean, it's no big deal.
But unfortunately, foundations and retaining walls are big deals. Yeah,
and so they require creative solutions. And that's why I think,
(21:37):
at the end of the day, I trust you guys
so much, because I don't. I have never once heard
you give me a recommendation that I thought was like, uh,
that seems overblown. I mean, I've never come back to
you and say, you know what, are you laughing at Roy? No,
I'm serious, No, this happens. This happens. I will tell
you something, Okay, I'm not going to mention I have
(21:59):
a project. I have a project in the northwest San
Fernando Valley. Let's just say it's in a town that
rhymes with tallabasis and and it's you know, we've got,
We've got. We're gonna build a deck. Okay, a huge deck.
I mean huge, like you know, it's gonna be one
(22:20):
hundred feet long. It's gonna be maybe sixty feet deep. Okay,
all on grade, all on, just perfectly flat. But there's
a little area where we get to a hillside dropping
off where in order to keep the deck square, I
want to extend this deck just over that about six feet,
(22:41):
which means now the slope underneath the leading edge of
the deck is four feet down. Now there's a four
foot dropped off. Now, just a gradual little drop off.
Speaker 5 (22:50):
All right.
Speaker 3 (22:51):
I gotta go to break because I'm seeing the light
flashing here. So everybody just hold tight. I'm going to
tell you the solution I got from or the note
that I got earlier this week from a civil engineer
about what had to be done to support this. It's
a deck, yeah, I just want to be clear. It's
a deck, all right, Hang tight, we'll talk about it
(23:12):
when we return.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
You're listening to Dean Sharp the House Whisper.
Speaker 6 (23:15):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on Demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 3 (23:20):
My how three hours just evaporates when you're dealing with
such a big topic and you've got experts with you
here and we're just trying to knock it all down.
Here we are in the last segment of today's show.
Thanks for joining us on the show. Don't go anywhere.
I still got a little bit left here, but thanks
to my special guests Mark and James, the Foundation guys
(23:41):
from Foundation Repair LA. So you guys were just about
to hear my rant, and I going to keep it
really short. I'm just saying because caisons, they just they
wake me up in the middle of the night in
hot sweats. So yeah, this little project right, got a
We're building a big deck. A deck, now I understand
(24:02):
a deck that has a live load. You can put
many as many people on a deck as you can
on the floor of a house. So yeah, it's got
to be built, right. But a little, just a little
bit of this deck, a little bit, a little wedge
literally is hanging out over the beginning of a slope
and just a little bit of a slope. And I'm
not saying that there isn't a structural concern there to
(24:23):
be reinforced, but man, I got to report back this
week from a particular uh civil engineer saying that here,
here's what you're going to need to do. You're going
to need seven casons poured under that little wedge slip
of a deck, seven casons at at like thirty forty
(24:45):
thousand dollars a pop.
Speaker 2 (24:47):
Okay, so.
Speaker 3 (24:51):
Over two hundred thousand dollars to support this little bit
of a lip of a deck that's hanging over this
other relatively completely flat lot. And so I don't know,
I don't know. I don't even know that. I mean,
I don't need you guys to comment on. I'm going
to show you the plan later you can tell me.
But but but but I I say that just to
say how much I appreciate your rational approaches to things,
(25:17):
you know. And James told me during the break that
might be necessary, Dean, and I'm like, all right, you're fired,
you're out of here, just to leave the studio right now.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
But no.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
But but the fact is, yeah, they are. And then
we discussed some other options. Right, So, these solutions they are,
there's no bible for them. There's no there's no you know,
written out law about the solutions you really need people
who are willing to think creatively and conscientiously about your
(25:47):
situation and to help you make the best decision about
the house before uh you know, I mean without compromising
the structural value of the house. It's a bit of
a balancing act, but it's really important, isn't it. Yep,
Absolutely one little thing to talk to to ask you about, James,
because you mentioned before a real estate inspections, right, home
(26:08):
inspectors are their job is to look at everything. It's
a generalist inspection of everything. But you've got concerns at
times that a real estate home inspector as a generalist
isn't necessarily going to see or understand certain foundation issues.
So are we saying that every real estate inspection you
should also call in somebody like you not necessarily.
Speaker 5 (26:32):
What I would say is pay attention to your home inspector,
and when he says call in an expert for the foundation,
listen to that piece of advice. Because it's often that
we go to a property and let's say it's something
built in the tens or the twenties, where it's got
a brick or rock foundation, or it's been heavily remodeled,
or it's on a slope. Those are the things where
(26:52):
it really pays just to have somebody look at your
foundation before you buy it and really get a proper
analysis of whether it's good or not. And sometimes you're
just paying for peace of mind, and that's totally fine too,
But we could have saved people a lot of money
looking at certain properties before they bought it. At least
they would have known what they were getting into.
Speaker 3 (27:13):
Right, Absolutely, I'm just gonna say that was a very
kind and conservative answer. But I'm just gonna say, if
you've got an older home, you've got a century home,
if you've got a hillside house, if you have a
house that has obviously been flipped, I mean it's clearly
that it's a remodel flip, you should call him a
foundation guy to at least take a look at it.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
I think I think it should just be you just
call him it.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
Yeah, regardless, think that's what I was trying to gently say, Well,
what's it gonna hurt? What's it gonna hurt to have
somebody take a look at it and who's a real
expert in that area?
Speaker 2 (27:42):
And sign off?
Speaker 3 (27:42):
Guys, thank you so much for joining me in studio.
Today is always a pleasure to sit down with you
guys and talk and glean from your expertise. And Foundation
guys dot com that's where everybody can reach you. Foundation
guys dot Com. Ask for Mark or James, or Mark
and James, either one, whichever one you like better, just
asking them both. Tell them I sent you and it's
(28:05):
going to be great. Thank you guys for being here.
Thanks Dean, thank you. Fine, all right, I'm gonna leave
you with this thought today. If you listen to the
show for any length of time, you've probably heard me
talk about why it is that you have so much
difficulty really seeing your home, why you look past so much.
You know it's because, to your credit, you're a resilient person.
(28:28):
And when resilient people encounter life's little imperfections, we don't
collapse and we don't pout about them.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
We make do.
Speaker 3 (28:35):
I have a quote from legendary coach John Wooden hanging
on my wall. It says things turn out best for
those who make the best of how things turn out,
and that is the art and the power of making do.
And there's no surviving or thriving in this life without
making do. But making do has a dark side. Sometimes
(28:57):
we make do with so much for so long that
we lose sight of and we stop fighting for the
life that we really want. We've spent so much time
accommodating circumstances that we forget that we still have choices.
How does that famous AA prayer go grant me the
serenity to accept the things I can't change, courage to
(29:17):
change the things I can, and the wisdom to know
the difference.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
Right.
Speaker 3 (29:19):
So, sure, there are things in your life that are
beyond changing, but not everything. Never everything. We've been talking
all morning about what to do when the bottom falls out, literally,
and when the very foundations of your world are resting
that your world is resting on begin to fail. I
am not unfamiliar with what this feels like in my
(29:42):
own life. The bottom has fallen out more than once,
and I'll tell you it's way more painful, and it's
soul wrenchingly unnerving. But believe it or not, there's even
an upside to foundation failure. When the bottom falls out,
When disappointments come, when your heart is crumbling, it show
bocks you awake from the numbness of making do. When
(30:02):
the bottom falls out, you learn what you really believe
what you really love, what you really treasure, and what
you don't. And as you slowly begin to rebuild your foundation,
you remember you have choices. You always have choices. Yeah,
you got to make do with some things, but not everything.
Never everything. And when we've been getting out of the
(30:23):
way of life for so long, when the bottom falls
out and you're forced to rebuild, well, you're the captain.
Speaker 5 (30:29):
Now.
Speaker 3 (30:29):
Now it's time for life to get out of your way.
When you face what you really believe, what you really love,
what you really treasure, and what you don't, it's time
to life to get out of your way. Time for
the world to make do with your choices, and it's
time for you to get busy building.
Speaker 2 (30:47):
Yourself a beautiful life.
Speaker 3 (30:49):
Everybody, enjoy this beautiful day today, and we'll see you
right back here next weekend.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
This has been Home with Dean Sharp, the House Whisper.
Tune into the live broadcast on KFI Am six forty
every Saturday morning from six to eight Pacific time, and
every Sunday morning from nine to noon Pacific time, or
anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app.
KFI AM six forty. You're listening to Dean Sharp the
House Whisper on demand on the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Today.
Speaker 3 (00:08):
On the program, we are We're just working to keep
your home above ground.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
That's what we're after.
Speaker 3 (00:13):
Today we're talking foundation repair, and I have very special
guests in studio with me, a couple of colleagues from
the industry who are my go to guys when it
comes to foundation problems. Mark and James, the Foundation guys
from Foundation Repair LA. I say this, you've probably heard
me talk about them, or maybe you've heard like one
(00:33):
of the ads that I've done for them during the week,
But this is absolutely true. There's nobody I trust more
than these two guys when it comes to this kind
of thing, because there are believe it or not, there
are even issues when it comes to homes that are
outside of my wheelhouse, and I often have to call
in experts and listen to them. And when that happens,
they've got to be people I trust implicitly, not only
(00:56):
trust to solve the problem, but also trust to take
care of our clients properly and honestly with integrity. These
are the guys that I call in and so It
is a privilege to have you guys in studio with
me today answering these questions and kind of you know,
laying out as it were. I didn't mean to say
it this way, but a foundation for people to understand
(01:17):
what's wrong with their okay, foundations so perfectly Yeah, I
don't know. I don't know if that was perfectly said,
but there you go. There was all right. So we
talked all sorts of stuff. We've taken some calls on foundation.
Now want to turn to the solutions because that's a
mystery to a lot of people, right you try and imagine, oh,
(01:39):
these there's a company that's going to come in and
fix the foundation on your home, Like what does that
even mean?
Speaker 2 (01:46):
How is that? And I'm sure you know, I mean,
we know.
Speaker 3 (01:49):
That there are a bunch of different ways to approach
foundations because there are a bunch of different problems. But
what's a typical problem that you encounter and how do
you actually go about fixing it. I'll just let you
set one up and you know, hit it out of
the park. What what's maybe one of the most typical
residential foundation problems?
Speaker 4 (02:10):
Well, you know, we have to go out determine what
was the problem. I mean, that's what we've been talking
about earlier, is you know, we've now determined by walking
through the house, looking on underneath, looking around the property, what.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Needs to be done.
Speaker 4 (02:24):
And let's take a house that you know, take a
really old house, one hundred year old house. Concrete wasn't
so good, maybe even has rock foundation or you know,
gobblestone foundation, rick foundations. Those usually you're going right towards
a foundation replacement. That would be kind of typical on
a very old home, especially when the concrete's deteriorating. When
(02:47):
you can take your hand and rake it across the concrete,
that's pretty bad.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (02:53):
So now, as a designer, I'm going to cut you off, Mark,
because as a designer, I'm going to hit the mute
button on you right there.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
Oh god, I'm talking over you. That feels good?
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Yeah, no, flow No, as a designer, because you know,
I get called in to do restorations on century homes
all the time, and the concern is always how does
this home? How can we get this home livable in
the twenty first century? But please don't destroy its century
old quality and aesthetics, right, you know, I mean, we
did the historic camp house, which was a green and
(03:23):
green house right over here in Sierra Madre. It had
literally river rock stone foundation. That's what that's all it had.
It's a miracle that it survived as long as it
did before we got to it and actually retro and
we did foundation replacement. But my first concern when I
heard that word foundation, I'm like, oh, you're not We're
(03:46):
not taking the river rock out, are we?
Speaker 2 (03:47):
All right?
Speaker 3 (03:48):
It didn't have to happen that way, because what happened
was crawled under there and sistered a brand new foundation
next to it on the back side of it where
nobody could see, and now it's as strong as the
other house in the area. So I just wanted to say,
because that's a concern that people have when we talk
about foundation replacement, So what does that mean to you
(04:10):
foundation replacement?
Speaker 4 (04:12):
Well, on that case, we would have evaluated the rock,
the river rock foundation to be worthy of keeping. Okay,
if the rocks are rolling out in the driveway and
rolling underneath the house, probably no point really it's saving that.
But you can do if the rock is good, you
would save it, and you do the sister, And that's
what you guys did on that project, So that was
(04:33):
a perfect solution for it. The sister foundation is a
brand new rebar reinforced, deepened foundation bolted to the house
that does the exact same thing as removing everything.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
That's a sister founding. It's sitting on the inside.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
It's sitting on the inside of the old foundation, and
essentially now that at that house, the camp house, the
river rock, the old river rock foundation is just a
decorative veneer exactly sitting on the outside the house. So
it hasn't lost its look, but it's not bearing the
load anymore.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
That's right now.
Speaker 4 (05:04):
In the way I started to mention, I mean, if
the rocks are all falling out and the mortar is
gone that held the rock in place, will build the
foundation in set and just plaster the rock back on
the face. That's another way you can to restore it. Literally,
have saved the rocks, okay, and reuse them. You can
do the same thing on the brick. The brick house
(05:25):
normally would do a sister foundation if the bricker's worth savings.
Now sometimes you'll have a brick or rock foundation you
can't even see. It's covered by sighting landscape that's up
up against it. It's not a visible component. Well, then
at that point there's really no point in saving the
rock and stuff like you just replace it.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
It's not doing its job, so it doesn't have an
aesthetic quality. Then at that time it doesn't. Yeah, yeah,
but the asthetic quality you definitely want to save, all right.
Part So all right, so that's a new foundation. That's great.
When we found a century old home that just has
a completely inadequate foundation. What if something is broken or sagging.
(06:04):
What if there's a floor way out of level, James,
what do we do then? Do you guys just go
in with your hands and lift it up and then
somebody shoves some things underneath or what?
Speaker 2 (06:12):
How does that work? Not quite? Okay?
Speaker 5 (06:14):
So so really we're getting onto the subject of settlement.
You know, movement. There's two aspects to correcting that. One
is the structural end of it. How do we get
it to stop moving so it doesn't move again? Okay,
you always want to do that first.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
Obviously.
Speaker 5 (06:28):
The second part of that would be the cosmetic end.
That's where we would jack it up, not with our hands.
We do use hydraulic jacks and other equipment and you
would lift it up and that would address the cosmetic
portion of the job. When it comes to a slab,
you can either remove and replace the slab, or you
(06:49):
can underpin it stop it from settling, and then you
can pour on top of it the self leveling layer.
But again, it's you know, it's into you've got structural
so the extent that it has settled, the geology around it,
whether it's on a hillside or not, how old it is,
those are things that are going to determine how do
(07:11):
we structurally repair it. Do we just replace the foundation
in that area? Do we underpin it? You know, underpinning
is putting a deeper foundation in underneath the existing Do we.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
Go full bore soils report.
Speaker 5 (07:25):
You know, casons or friction piles. All right, so we're
gonna that's that's deep water. We're gonna get into that. Okay,
I want to come back to that right after the break. Yep, Okay,
underpinning casons. Oh, the word cason, people just their hearts
drop if they actually know what a cason is. They're like,
oh no, that's like sixty feet deep, right, and to
(07:45):
cost eight hundred thousand dollars.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
No, not quite, okay, all right, all right, all right,
we'll clear that up. Okay.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
On the other side of the break your Home with
Dean Sharp, the house Whisper.
Speaker 6 (07:55):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI A M six forty A pleasure.
Speaker 3 (08:01):
It is an honor to spend time with you on
a Sunday morning talking about this all important thing to
all of us, your home. And today we're talking about
the very foundation of your home, foundation repair work, and
I'm doing with my special in studio guests Mark and James,
the Foundation guys from Foundation Repair LA. All right before
(08:23):
the break. Now we're talking about things that you guys
do to fix and repair things. Some of the techniques
that you use are some of the approaches that you take.
And James, before I get into the Kson question, I
just want to clarify when when you say that you
know a sagging foundation sloping foundation on a house, when
(08:43):
you say underpinning, that means you know, digging underneath the
existing footings that are there and creating a larger, more
substantial pad to stop the sloping to First of all,
you stop, like you said, Mark, you stop the problem
from going any further. But then that still leaves us
with something that's at a level. Either the stem wall
is at a level, the slab is out of level.
(09:04):
But I wanted to make sure our listeners understand, well,
when you talk about jacking up a house, after that,
you're talking about a raised foundation house that we've stopped
the concrete from sloping any further. And in a raise
foundation situation, we can get jacks underneath the house and
get them on the wood, the floor joists themselves and
(09:25):
actually get that thing level again. And then you know,
I don't want to use the word shim as if
it's a little but basically then infill between and stabilize
the house. But that's you're not talking about a slab situation,
right correct? Okay, yeah, so raise foundations are much easier
to lift. I mean, you're not going to really be
able to lift a concrete slab without breaking it causing
(09:47):
further issues. And then you leave, you would leave a
void underneath it if you were to lift it, right,
so the slab stays where it is now. Unless so
you got two situations. What if I've got a slab
that's pretty much intact, but it has just kind of
broken at one line and the whole thing is kind
of sloped.
Speaker 5 (10:03):
You can top that with a self leveling cement. The
slab does have to be in good enough shape for
that to hold together. You could replace the slab and
pour it level. We can lift the wood frame wall
off of the slab to that extent. Then you end
up with a nice level ceiling as well. See, you
(10:24):
have options. I mean it depends on you know, the
client's budget and how bad the problem is. What do
they want to do with it. Sometimes it's not bad
enough to go full bore, replace the slab, lift the
framing off of it.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
Right.
Speaker 3 (10:37):
So again, it can go all the way from just
cosmetic on the inside to unbolting the walls and lifting
them up and getting a new slab poured underneath it
for that section. Yep, so and everything and anything in between. Sure,
depending on how far they want to go. Mark, you
were talking about bolting a house. Yes, what are we
talking about bolting a house?
Speaker 4 (10:58):
Well? We always you know, you hear the bolting term.
I have a bolt and I need to bolt my
house or seismic retrofit. This is earthquake retrofitting right.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Like Brason Bolt.
Speaker 4 (11:07):
Brayson Bolt is a California's program. So bolting is what
we know most people know about, but there's actually three
major components. Bolting is one of them. The next two
components have to do with the rest of the type
of foundation. On a raised foundation, you might have what
we call cripple walls kind of a politically incorrect term
(11:31):
now but short wood walls. So you have the concrete foundation,
then a wooden wall that goes up to the floor
and it might be varying heights that has to be reinforced.
I always use the analogy like a house of cards.
You could everybody knows about a house of cards. You
can build a house of cards, put a card on top,
and it's very you know, it's kind of amazing. You
can have these playing cards hold up that flat piece
(11:53):
of card. But you know, if I'm going to push
on one side, it's just a tip over. Cripple walls
are very weak that they're just a bunch of wooden
studs would two by fours typically, and they need to
be reinforced with plywood.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
So that's a second component.
Speaker 3 (12:08):
So they have to be turned into essentially a kind
of shear wall or sheer resistant wall that can resist
the lateral force, not the downforce. They're doing just fine
with the dead load weight, but the lateral forces on
that wall that would keep it from falling over.
Speaker 4 (12:22):
Right, So that's the second main component. Now, many houses
don't have cripple walls. Concrete goes all the way up
to the floor, so that component wouldn't be done. But
if you have cripple walls, they are particularly susceptible to
earthquake damage. And then there's the third component, which both
houses with cripple walls and without cripple walls, is tying
the floors to what got bolted. So you actually tie
(12:46):
the floor joists get tied to the wooden sill plate
or bottom plate that got bolted to the concrete, so
that it's a complete connection from the floor to the
concrete and just spends what kind of foundation have now,
slab houses, slab foundations, you don't retrofit. They don't have
that intermediate crawl space section. They have a different kind
(13:08):
of component, and they're usually bolted. Sometimes they're nailed to
the concrete.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
Yeah. Yeah, so that's not the same level of concern.
Speaker 4 (13:17):
No, you don't have there's not this extra component. When
you have a raised foundation, you have this extra component.
Slab foundations. They're sitting on the ground already. They're already
on the ground where a raised foundations not. And that's
why the programs that are out there is for these
bolting programs, it's actually a retrofit those three components.
Speaker 3 (13:36):
Right now, you guys, we're talking during the break, You guys,
I love the fact that you guys approach these solutions
as practically as you do. You're talking about the idea
like an older home that's a raised foundation house could
be settling. The whole outside perimeter foundation could be sinking
down evenly, but sinking down into the soil after a
(13:57):
century or so. But the center, like where the little
California basement, it's not sinking at all.
Speaker 5 (14:03):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
And so the middle of the house is not sinking.
The outside of the house has sunk down, but it's
sunk down relatively evenly. Your approach might be, you know,
why jack up the entire outside of the foundation. We'll
just lower the middle part of the house to get
it even because the goal is flat.
Speaker 4 (14:20):
Right. Yes, So it's a very simple solution to the problem.
And it says, hey, it took seventy five years or
eighty years to sink around the perimeter, and you now
got a hump in the middle of the house. And
what I'm gonna lift the whole house just to handle
this hump. Why don't I just lower it? And it's
now all a level and all I mean, And we
won't have that problem for another fifty years. Fifty years,
(14:42):
you know, and we'll look at it again.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
All right, there you go. All right, I got more
questions for you.
Speaker 3 (14:46):
We're going to do it on the other side of
the break your Home with Dean Sharp, the house whisper.
Speaker 6 (14:51):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six.
Speaker 3 (14:56):
Forty, and we are getting it done today. We're talking
Foundation with my special in studio guest Mark and James
from Foundation Repair LA. It's been a fascinating conversation so far.
Lots of good information going out there. Let's talk about
the C word caissons. Okay, I wasn't sure where that
(15:17):
was going on there, Dean. They both looked at me like,
what are you doing? This is the family show Hillside House,
Hillside Repairs, and we're not talking about repairing the hillside.
We're talking about repairing the house. If we got a
hillside house it's starting to slip casson. I mean, that's
pretty much where we're at. Sometimes there is no other solution.
(15:41):
You will run into circumstances when you know the hillside
is steep enough or there's been enough settlement. There just
isn't another solution that's gonna work. All right, Explain what
a cason is. A cason is essentially a drilled shaft
that is filled with reinforcing bars steel rebar and then
filled with concrete. And that's what your house sits on.
(16:02):
You mentioned earlier sixty feet deep. A lot of times
they're not anywhere near that deep. They can be I
was exaggerating, Okay. I also said they cost eight hundred
thousand dollars. They don't usually, but they can't. Oh geez,
you didn't have to say that. I think very rarely,
very rarely.
Speaker 5 (16:20):
But if you take one of these thirty thousand square
foot you know mansions in Malibu that's new construction, they
could be doing.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
Something like that.
Speaker 5 (16:27):
Well, sure, but that's not we're not doing new construction.
So no, Typically, if the house is on enough of
the hillside or the soul's conditions are poor enough, and
we need a geological report, and we have to go
down to a better strata of material. I eat bedrock
or you know, whatever the soul's engineer recommends on that
particular project. A lot of times they'll be fifteen feet
(16:49):
deep or twenty feet deep. But it's an effective way
to stop movement on a hillside where nothing else will work.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
Right.
Speaker 3 (16:57):
A lot of people look at hillside houses and they're like, oh,
no way, that's crazy. You know, the house built up
on stilts. But if those stilts are anchored into a
cason that is actually sitting on down at the bottom,
sitting on bedrock, that house has got a foundation that
will outlast you know, many of the ones that are
sitting out in the flats, you know, just because I
(17:20):
mean it's on bedrock, it's on roy has a hillside house.
So sitting on bedrock, that's the goal of the case
on to reach firmer material so it doesn't slide. And
sometimes it's just necessary.
Speaker 4 (17:34):
It's also what's important too, is it is the cheapest
way to support the house at that in that kind
of condition. The other alternative is what you can excavate
the whole mountain side and pour a whole concrete foundation
thirty feet deep to get to good material all the
way around house. That's prohibited. You can't do that. So
the caseon, actually it's kind of a misnomer. You think
(17:57):
it's bad. It's actually a solution to the prom and
it's an economical solution. They may be twenty feet apart
or fifteen feet apart between the next case on, So
you're distributing load over a vast area going deep, and
there is no other alternative.
Speaker 2 (18:16):
To get a lot of bang for the buck in
the right situation. Exactly what do you.
Speaker 3 (18:19):
Guys do when a Okay, so let's let's talk about
retaining walls. Now, what if I got to retain a
real retap I'm not talking about a garden wall. And
people should know the difference. Okay, if you've got a
block wall in between you and your neighbor, Okay, and
you look over the other side, you're standing there, and
your neighbor's standing there, and he's not higher up than you.
(18:40):
You're both just standing on the same plant. That's just
a fence made out of block wall, correct, made out
of cinder block. Right, A retaining wall is holding back
over three feet of vertical material. It's actually retaining soil.
What if I've got a retaining wall that's starting to
roll over start, you know, it's leaning leaning in obviously
from the pressure of the soil.
Speaker 2 (18:59):
You guys, deal, what do you do with that?
Speaker 5 (19:02):
Well?
Speaker 2 (19:03):
How much leaning are we talking? Oh?
Speaker 5 (19:05):
How much leaning would you like me to talk about? Well,
I mean a rule of thumb is ten percent.
Speaker 2 (19:10):
Okay.
Speaker 5 (19:10):
You know, if you have a wall that's six feet
tall seventy two inches about seven inches out of plumb,
you're typically going to consider that failed.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
Okay, let's say that's what I've got. Let's say I'm
let drop a plumb line down. I'm like, wow, that
thing is it's six or seven inches out from top
to bottom.
Speaker 2 (19:27):
Six foot wall.
Speaker 5 (19:28):
So I mean you'd be looking at either putting a
new wall in front of it, generally or replacing it.
If you catch it early enough, you can do things
like subdrains behind it manage the water flow, but swales
in things that are going to you know, minimize and
if it does happen, release hydrostatic pressure from behind the wall.
If you can get it early enough, you know, you
(19:48):
may be able to save it. But typically once it's
once that wall is rotating, it's it's heading towards the
end of its life.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
So you guys are going to come inside that wall
you can you can do that or you replace it.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
It really depends on the damage.
Speaker 3 (20:05):
If I pull that wall, I mean we're talking about
replacing it, how do you shore up the do you
have to excavate the backside of it to keep it
from you know, because I can't just pull the wall
out and then the hillside comes into my yard.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Yeah, you have to cut back.
Speaker 4 (20:18):
And if it's on a property line, it's going to
affect your neighbors as well. And then another consideration is
the landscaping. You know, maybe it's lined with trees, So
now we've got to consider the trees. So again it's
going to be every condition is going to have to
be looked at, each site looked at, maybe a different solution.
Speaker 3 (20:36):
Speaking of trees, let's say I've got a retaining wall
like running along my back slope. You know, I've got
one of those houses that's got to slope up, you know,
backslope coming out of the rear yard, tree up on
the slope. Okay, most of the wall end to end,
it's in good shape, but clearly from root action or something.
(20:57):
Now the middle of the wall's bulging out, the whole wall,
just the middle.
Speaker 2 (21:01):
What do we do with that? Could replace it?
Speaker 5 (21:03):
Section of it? Good sister, A section of it. It's
you know, it's difficult to say without seeing it. What's
the exact circumstance, How tall is it?
Speaker 2 (21:15):
How long?
Speaker 3 (21:15):
I just want you to solve all my problems sight unseen, James.
I just clearly that's what I'm asking for here. I'm
just saying, like, don't worry, Dean, it's no big deal.
But unfortunately, foundations and retaining walls are big deals. Yeah,
and so they require creative solutions. And that's why I think,
(21:37):
at the end of the day, I trust you guys
so much, because I don't. I have never once heard
you give me a recommendation that I thought was like, uh,
that seems overblown. I mean, I've never come back to
you and say, you know what, are you laughing at Roy? No,
I'm serious, No, this happens. This happens. I will tell
you something, Okay, I'm not going to mention I have
(21:59):
a project. I have a project in the northwest San
Fernando Valley. Let's just say it's in a town that
rhymes with tallabasis and and it's you know, we've got,
We've got. We're gonna build a deck. Okay, a huge deck.
I mean huge, like you know, it's gonna be one
(22:20):
hundred feet long. It's gonna be maybe sixty feet deep. Okay,
all on grade, all on, just perfectly flat. But there's
a little area where we get to a hillside dropping
off where in order to keep the deck square, I
want to extend this deck just over that about six feet,
(22:41):
which means now the slope underneath the leading edge of
the deck is four feet down. Now there's a four
foot dropped off. Now, just a gradual little drop off.
Speaker 5 (22:50):
All right.
Speaker 3 (22:51):
I gotta go to break because I'm seeing the light
flashing here. So everybody just hold tight. I'm going to
tell you the solution I got from or the note
that I got earlier this week from a civil engineer
about what had to be done to support this. It's
a deck, yeah, I just want to be clear. It's
a deck, all right, Hang tight, we'll talk about it
(23:12):
when we return.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
You're listening to Dean Sharp the House Whisper.
Speaker 6 (23:15):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on Demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 3 (23:20):
My how three hours just evaporates when you're dealing with
such a big topic and you've got experts with you
here and we're just trying to knock it all down.
Here we are in the last segment of today's show.
Thanks for joining us on the show. Don't go anywhere.
I still got a little bit left here, but thanks
to my special guests Mark and James, the Foundation guys
(23:41):
from Foundation Repair LA. So you guys were just about
to hear my rant, and I going to keep it
really short. I'm just saying because caisons, they just they
wake me up in the middle of the night in
hot sweats. So yeah, this little project right, got a
We're building a big deck. A deck, now I understand
(24:02):
a deck that has a live load. You can put
many as many people on a deck as you can
on the floor of a house. So yeah, it's got
to be built, right. But a little, just a little
bit of this deck, a little bit, a little wedge
literally is hanging out over the beginning of a slope
and just a little bit of a slope. And I'm
not saying that there isn't a structural concern there to
(24:23):
be reinforced, but man, I got to report back this
week from a particular uh civil engineer saying that here,
here's what you're going to need to do. You're going
to need seven casons poured under that little wedge slip
of a deck, seven casons at at like thirty forty
(24:45):
thousand dollars a pop.
Speaker 2 (24:47):
Okay, so.
Speaker 3 (24:51):
Over two hundred thousand dollars to support this little bit
of a lip of a deck that's hanging over this
other relatively completely flat lot. And so I don't know,
I don't know. I don't even know that. I mean,
I don't need you guys to comment on. I'm going
to show you the plan later you can tell me.
But but but but I I say that just to
say how much I appreciate your rational approaches to things,
(25:17):
you know. And James told me during the break that
might be necessary, Dean, and I'm like, all right, you're fired,
you're out of here, just to leave the studio right now.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
But no.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
But but the fact is, yeah, they are. And then
we discussed some other options. Right, So, these solutions they are,
there's no bible for them. There's no there's no you know,
written out law about the solutions you really need people
who are willing to think creatively and conscientiously about your
(25:47):
situation and to help you make the best decision about
the house before uh you know, I mean without compromising
the structural value of the house. It's a bit of
a balancing act, but it's really important, isn't it. Yep,
Absolutely one little thing to talk to to ask you about, James,
because you mentioned before a real estate inspections, right, home
(26:08):
inspectors are their job is to look at everything. It's
a generalist inspection of everything. But you've got concerns at
times that a real estate home inspector as a generalist
isn't necessarily going to see or understand certain foundation issues.
So are we saying that every real estate inspection you
should also call in somebody like you not necessarily.
Speaker 5 (26:32):
What I would say is pay attention to your home inspector,
and when he says call in an expert for the foundation,
listen to that piece of advice. Because it's often that
we go to a property and let's say it's something
built in the tens or the twenties, where it's got
a brick or rock foundation, or it's been heavily remodeled,
or it's on a slope. Those are the things where
(26:52):
it really pays just to have somebody look at your
foundation before you buy it and really get a proper
analysis of whether it's good or not. And sometimes you're
just paying for peace of mind, and that's totally fine too,
But we could have saved people a lot of money
looking at certain properties before they bought it. At least
they would have known what they were getting into.
Speaker 3 (27:13):
Right, Absolutely, I'm just gonna say that was a very
kind and conservative answer. But I'm just gonna say, if
you've got an older home, you've got a century home,
if you've got a hillside house, if you have a
house that has obviously been flipped, I mean it's clearly
that it's a remodel flip, you should call him a
foundation guy to at least take a look at it.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
I think I think it should just be you just
call him it.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
Yeah, regardless, think that's what I was trying to gently say, Well,
what's it gonna hurt? What's it gonna hurt to have
somebody take a look at it and who's a real
expert in that area?
Speaker 2 (27:42):
And sign off?
Speaker 3 (27:42):
Guys, thank you so much for joining me in studio.
Today is always a pleasure to sit down with you
guys and talk and glean from your expertise. And Foundation
guys dot com that's where everybody can reach you. Foundation
guys dot Com. Ask for Mark or James, or Mark
and James, either one, whichever one you like better, just
asking them both. Tell them I sent you and it's
(28:05):
going to be great. Thank you guys for being here.
Thanks Dean, thank you. Fine, all right, I'm gonna leave
you with this thought today. If you listen to the
show for any length of time, you've probably heard me
talk about why it is that you have so much
difficulty really seeing your home, why you look past so much.
You know it's because, to your credit, you're a resilient person.
(28:28):
And when resilient people encounter life's little imperfections, we don't
collapse and we don't pout about them.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
We make do.
Speaker 3 (28:35):
I have a quote from legendary coach John Wooden hanging
on my wall. It says things turn out best for
those who make the best of how things turn out,
and that is the art and the power of making do.
And there's no surviving or thriving in this life without
making do. But making do has a dark side. Sometimes
(28:57):
we make do with so much for so long that
we lose sight of and we stop fighting for the
life that we really want. We've spent so much time
accommodating circumstances that we forget that we still have choices.
How does that famous AA prayer go grant me the
serenity to accept the things I can't change, courage to
(29:17):
change the things I can, and the wisdom to know
the difference.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
Right.
Speaker 3 (29:19):
So, sure, there are things in your life that are
beyond changing, but not everything. Never everything. We've been talking
all morning about what to do when the bottom falls out, literally,
and when the very foundations of your world are resting
that your world is resting on begin to fail. I
am not unfamiliar with what this feels like in my
(29:42):
own life. The bottom has fallen out more than once,
and I'll tell you it's way more painful, and it's
soul wrenchingly unnerving. But believe it or not, there's even
an upside to foundation failure. When the bottom falls out,
When disappointments come, when your heart is crumbling, it show
bocks you awake from the numbness of making do. When
(30:02):
the bottom falls out, you learn what you really believe
what you really love, what you really treasure, and what
you don't. And as you slowly begin to rebuild your foundation,
you remember you have choices. You always have choices. Yeah,
you got to make do with some things, but not everything.
Never everything. And when we've been getting out of the
(30:23):
way of life for so long, when the bottom falls
out and you're forced to rebuild, well, you're the captain.
Speaker 5 (30:29):
Now.
Speaker 3 (30:29):
Now it's time for life to get out of your way.
When you face what you really believe, what you really love,
what you really treasure, and what you don't, it's time
to life to get out of your way. Time for
the world to make do with your choices, and it's
time for you to get busy building.
Speaker 2 (30:47):
Yourself a beautiful life.
Speaker 3 (30:49):
Everybody, enjoy this beautiful day today, and we'll see you
right back here next weekend.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
This has been Home with Dean Sharp, the House Whisper.
Tune into the live broadcast on KFI Am six forty
every Saturday morning from six to eight Pacific time, and
every Sunday morning from nine to noon Pacific time, or
anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app.
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