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Foundation Repair Plans, Sealed by an Independent Texas PE

The repair designed before it is bid: pier type, locations, depth, and design load specified by an engineer who is not selling the piers.

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Sealed Engineering is not yet accepting orders. Firm registration is pending with the Texas Board of Professional Engineers and Land Surveyors, and no engineering services are being offered or performed under this brand until it is granted. Founding customers on the waitlist are contacted first when ordering opens.

Why the plan comes before the bids

The normal sequence in Texas residential foundation repair is backwards. A company evaluates for free, proposes a pier count, and the homeowner collects two more proposals with different pier counts in different locations. Nothing about those three numbers is comparable, and the homeowner ends up choosing on price between three different repairs.

A sealed repair plan inverts it. The engineer establishes what the foundation is doing, designs the remedy, and specifies where the piers go, how deep, and what each one has to carry. Then the same scope goes to three contractors and the bids are actually about price and workmanship.

What the design decides

Pier type is the first decision and it follows the soil and the structure. Drilled and belled concrete piers bear on stable strata below the active clay zone and are the traditional Texas answer. Pressed concrete cylinder piles are driven with the weight of the structure and are faster and less disruptive. Steel pipe piles reach deeper where competent bearing is far down. Each has a place, and each has conditions where it is the wrong choice.

Depth follows the depth of the active zone at the site and the location of bearing material. In much of Texas the seasonal moisture active zone extends well below the shallow footings the house was built on, which is the entire reason the house moved.

Spacing and location follow the load. Piers are placed where the structure can carry the concentrated reaction into them, along grade beams and at load points, and spaced so the beam between them spans without distress. A plan that places piers on uniform centers around a perimeter without regard to where load actually is has not designed anything.

The part of the plan that is not piers

Most Texas foundation movement is a moisture problem, and a repair that installs piers without addressing moisture is a repair that will be revisited. The plan specifies the drainage and moisture management the site needs: positive grade away from the foundation, downspout discharge carried away rather than dropped at the corner, irrigation relocated off the perimeter, and where appropriate a consistent perimeter moisture regime maintained through the dry season.

It also states what elevation the repair is targeting. Lifting a foundation back to level is frequently the wrong goal, because a structure that has been distorted for fifteen years has finishes, plumbing, and masonry that have adapted to the current shape. The plan states a target and the reason for it.

What arrives

A sealed and signed repair plan on engineering letterhead.
A foundation plan showing pier locations, with the elevation survey they were designed from.
Pier type, minimum depth, design load, and installation requirements.
The target elevation condition and the tolerance the repair works to.
Drainage and moisture management requirements for the site.
Inspection points, and what the engineer needs to observe during installation.

Requires a site visit and an elevation survey. Where a recent sealed inspection report already exists, that work is not repeated.

What has to exist first

An engineer seals what the evidence supports, so this list is the work rather than the paperwork around it. Anything missing is named rather than assumed.

Property address and access, including crawl space access where applicable.
A prior foundation inspection report or elevation survey, if one exists.
Any repair proposals already received, which are useful context rather than a design.
Foundation type: slab on grade, post tensioned, or pier and beam.
Plumbing test results if a leak has been suspected or confirmed.
Known repair history, including prior piers and where they were placed.

Foundation Repair Plans: common questions

Do I need an inspection report first, or does the plan include it?

The plan needs an elevation survey and an assessment to design from. If a recent sealed foundation inspection report exists, it is used and the work is not duplicated. If not, that assessment happens as part of producing the plan, which is why a site visit is required either way.

Can you design the repair the contractor already proposed?

The proposal is read and it is genuinely useful context. What will not happen is a seal applied to somebody else's pier count without independently establishing that it is the right one. If the independent design agrees with the proposal, it will say so, and that is a real outcome that happens regularly.

How many piers will my house need?

That cannot be answered before the elevation survey and site assessment, and a number offered over the phone is a sales figure rather than an engineering one. What can be said is what the design will be based on: measured deflection, load locations, soil conditions, and the structural system.

Should the house be lifted all the way back to level?

Usually not, and this surprises people. A house that has been out of level for years has masonry, plumbing, and finishes that have taken the current shape, and forcing it back can crack things that are currently intact. The plan states a target elevation and the reasoning, which is usually about restoring performance rather than restoring geometry.

Does the plan cover the permit?

The plan is what the permit office needs from an engineer. Filing the permit and paying its fee is the owner's or the contractor's step, and jurisdictions differ on which of them they will accept it from.

Where this is ordered most in Texas

Wind speed, soil, and the permit office all change by market, and so does what this document has to address. These pages are written for the market rather than templated across it.

Often needed alongside this

Need a foundation repair plan?

Start with the property address and we will tell you exactly what else is needed.

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