LESLIE: José in Florida, you’ve got some unwanted water. Tell us what happens.
JOSÉ: I’ve got a question. I’ve got a friend of ours who has a Florida room that she built, but I believe they didn’t put it up to grade just right. And every time it rains a lot, she gets water coming in between the sole plate and the concrete and it just seeps in to the floor. And I just wanted to know what can I do to prevent that; to keep that water out of there?
TOM: So it’s at the juncture between the Florida room and the house?
JOSÉ: Well yeah, it was added on to the house …
TOM: Right.
JOSÉ: … and it was just an addition added on. There isn’t very much space between the top of the concrete and the existing grade.
TOM: Well, what you’re probably going to have to do – because obviously you can’t make it any higher – is you’re probably going to have to put a curtain drain around it, José. The way you would do that is you would excavate some soil at the foundation perimeter. You’d only need to go down about 12 inches. Then you would put in some gray gravel and perforated pipe. Now, I prefer the solid PVC perforated pipe. And what you want to do is pitch that very slightly and then drain it somewhere. And then cover it with more stone and then some filter cloth and then soil. And what that will do is that will act sort of as an in-ground gutter to collect any water that’s forming in that foundation area. And that will stop the water from getting into the concrete and then soaking up. It’s probably water that through the force of capillarity is actually pulling up into the concrete and that’s why it’s getting wet. So if you give the water some place else to go, it probably won’t do that any longer.
JOSÉ: Hey, that’s great.
TOM: Yeah well, that’s the right thing to do. You definitely want to deal with the water first and then talk about the carpet or the floor covering.
JOSÉ: I appreciate it. Thank you very much.
TOM: You’re welcome, José. Thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEY-PIT.
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