Any experience with a slab leak?

[bisous]

Our rental home has water oozing through the floor. We have talked to our landlord who will call the plumber tomorrow. We have turned off water to our home. Google tells us this is what we might be looking at. How bad is this?

[WatchingThemGrow]

Oh no. I think they have to jackhammer your floor to repair it...although they seem to have other options for repair now - lining, repiping outside the slab. I know in FL a secretive process was done to find leaks. Hoping they find it easily! This is a bargaining point if you're still thinking about trying to buy the place!

[Liziz]

Ugh! Sorry to hear this. Hopefully you noticed before too many of your things were damaged?

We had one in our house. It was under the slab though -- water wasn't oozing through the floor. In our case, the process was that a plumber came out and used cameras to identify where the leaks where in the piping under the house. Instead of jackhammering the slab, they approached the leak from the outside -- a 4ft round tunnel was dug 14 feet under our house, then they went in and repaired the leaks through that tunnel. There was another much smaller tunnel in the front of the house as well. But if that's what you're facing, and there's already water coming up through the house, then perhaps going through the floor will be the best plan, especially as the floor is likely already damaged already.

The process took a long time (over a week for sure, maybe longer? It was a few years ago), but most of it was outside our house so it wasn't horribly inconvenient to us. We had use of our water during that time though, as the leaks were just dripping into the ground and weren't affecting our interior, so we could leave the water on. The time it took was mostly the tunneling. It was expensive (I recall the bills being in the 11-12K range) but homeowners insurance paid for it completely, minus the deductible, thank goodness.

Fingers crossed for you that whatever is going on will be a fairly simple fix and nothing so complex!

[marymoo86]

Not good. I am not sure how common slab houses are here but for this issue alone is why we never considered owning a slab foundation home.

I hope if there's a leak that perhaps it is outside of the foundation.

[twowhat?]

Yes, it's a PITA. You will want a good plumber who can accurately localize where the leak is in order to avoid jackhammering too much of your floor. If you're lucky they won't need to jackhammer anything and perhaps the leak is just at the base of a wall. If you're lucky, they will be able to repair the leak without breaking up any slab, or re-route the leaking line through the attic. If you're lucky it may not even be a slab leak and could be something like the dishwasher leaking behind a cabinet or something similar.

But you are in a rental, so there's that! LOL! It won't be on your dime...other than the inconvenience of having people coming into your house and having the water turned off. What we did while we were waiting for a plumber was to turn the water on, fill bathtubs/containers with water to use for flushing toilets, washing hands, drinking, and then turn the water off. Hopefully the plumber can get there asap.

For our house enough of the wood floor was damaged that we had to replace it ALL (all downstairs wood flooring since it was continuous) and decided then to embark on a remodel journey and in the end we're so much happier with our lighter brighter home but the process was definitely a PITA.

[bisous]

Yes, we’re renters. We do hope to buy this place at some point. So Im conflicted about how I feel about this. We’re making do without water. Hopefully it’s not a slab leak.

[craftysierra]

Slab leaks can be tricky to locate. Water can travel along the pipe. Do you have a section of the floor that was previously warm or cold? Hope the leak is fixed quickly.

[Kestrel]

As I understand it, two possibilities:

When the water is turned on, but no one is actually using any - check the meter. If it moves, you have a pipe leak someplace.

A slab can also pick up moisture from outside, if there's been exterior flooding or damage to the exterior/seal of the slab - and water is actually coming from outside.

In any case, a job for a pro!

[Liziz]

Bisous, I've been thinking about you and your floor! Did the plumber come out? What's the verdict?

[doberbrat]

I've been thinking of you too. Let us know the verdict if you can