Whatever's wrong under your house — standing water, wood rot, sagging floors, fallen insulation, mold — we diagnose it on the spot and hand you a fixed-price plan the same day. No pressure, no scare tactics.
A licensed local crew — usually out in 24 to 72 hours. Written scope, fixed price, no pressure.
Last month I got called out to a 1965 brick ranch off Franklin Blvd, a couple blocks west of the older commercial stretch. The homeowner had noticed the hallway floor was bouncing when he walked from the kitchen to the back bedroom and he wanted to know if it was a big deal. I asked him how long it had been doing that and he said maybe two years. He was hoping for a quick shim job. Under the house I found what I expected: original 6-mil plastic in rags, foil fiberglass batts hanging by a corner or gone entirely, the girder running down the center of the house sagging visibly under the load, and about three inches of daylight between the top of the pier stack under the mid-span and the underside of the girder where somebody had wedged a cedar shim thirty years ago that had rotted and compressed. The girder itself had a crack in the bottom fiber running about six feet, and a joist pocket where the joist end was black and spongy. That was not a shim job. That was a girder replacement with joist sistering and a permit.
Crawlspace repair in Gastonia is not one thing. It is a category that covers pier shimming and re-plumbing on the 40s to 70s brick ranches along Franklin Blvd, Union Rd, and Ozark Ave; girder replacement and joist sistering on the same houses where moisture has been at it for decades; subfloor patching where a leak or condensate drip finally chewed through the plywood or the tongue-and-groove; brick pier shoring on the pre-1930s mill houses near Downtown Gastonia and around the Loray Mill area; and foundation crack sealing on the industrial-corridor stock west and northwest of downtown where old fill dirt made the block move twenty years ago and stop. Each of those is a different scope with a different sequence and a different permit story with Gaston County.
The one thing they all have in common is that they should almost never happen in isolation. If a girder rotted enough to need replacement, moisture caused it. If a pier moved enough to need re-shimming, either the footing was inadequate or the ground under it got wet and moved. If a subfloor patch is needed, the leak that caused it needs to be identified and stopped. Repair work without addressing the moisture story is a temporary fix. I have re-crawled Franklin Blvd ranches five years after another crew sistered joists and put down new plastic, and the sistering is already showing surface fungal growth because nobody dealt with the vent problem. The repair sequence in Gastonia is always: stop the water source, do the structural repair, then encapsulate to protect what you just fixed. Free on-site inspection anywhere in Gaston County. Fixed written quote per scope with photos. No franchise theatrics.
Repair scope in Gastonia starts with a proper structural read on the free inspection. I bring a moisture meter, a level, a screwdriver for probing suspect wood, and a flashlight strong enough to see whether a crack in the block is fresh or twenty years stable. On the 40s to 70s brick ranch belt along Franklin Blvd, Union Rd, New Hope Rd, and Ozark Ave the recurring findings are: girder mid-span sag from decades of moisture cycling, joist ends soft where they bear on the block pockets, joists sistered by the previous owner or a handyman using undersized lumber and no adhesive, piers shimmed with random material from brick chunks to cedar wedges to a hardware-store 2x6 offcut, and subfloor patches over old plumbing leaks that were never properly integrated with the surrounding sheathing. On the pre-1930s mill houses near Downtown Gastonia and the Loray Mill area the recurring finding is out-of-plumb brick pier stacks sitting on shallow lime-mortared footings, sometimes on tamped dirt with no real footing at all.
Sequencing is the whole game. If we are replacing a rotted girder under a Union Rd ranch, the shoring goes in first — Tiger SmartJack adjustable steel posts on new concrete pads, spaced to carry the load while the girder is out. If we are sistering joists, the sister material is Douglas fir or SYP full-length lumber the same nominal depth as the original, bonded with construction adhesive and fastened per code with structural screws not nails, and any bearing correction at the block pocket happens first with a steel bearing plate if the pocket is spalled. If we are patching subfloor, the patch is 3/4-inch tongue-and-groove sheathing let into the existing plane with a full perimeter of blocking below and glue-and-screw fastening, not toenailed from above. If we are shoring pre-1930s brick piers near Downtown Gastonia, the SmartJacks sit on new poured concrete pads at proper footing depth and the load transfers from the failing brick stack to the steel column, sometimes permanently and sometimes just long enough to rebuild the brick pier properly.
Gaston County permits kick in for the structural work. Girder replacement, joist sistering across a substantial footprint, subfloor patching of any real size, and any work that adds a load path or changes an existing one requires a Gaston County building permit and inspection. We pull those. Interior perimeter drain electrical for a sump pump requires a Gaston County electrical permit. The 2018 North Carolina Residential Code governs — no county residential amendments that change the structural game. On the pre-1930s mill houses near Downtown Gastonia, some interior work is close enough to historic character that a call to the county building office before we file is worth the ten minutes. The permit sequence adds a couple of days to the front end of the job but it protects the homeowner on resale and on any insurance claim down the road.
Repair materials in Gastonia are graded by scope. Sister joist material is full-length Douglas fir #2 or SYP #2 the same nominal depth as the original — 2x8 or 2x10 typically on the 40s to 70s ranch stock, occasionally 2x12 on the wider spans in the Robinwood HOA 2000s tract homes. Construction adhesive is PL Premium or Loctite PL 3X, applied full-face, and fasteners are Simpson SDWS timber screws at code spacing, not framing nails. Shoring posts are Tiger SmartJack or Grip-Tite adjustable steel columns rated for the actual load, bearing on new 24-by-24-inch concrete pads poured to Gaston County code depth of 12 inches below finished grade. Bearing plates at the block pockets on Franklin Blvd and Union Rd ranch girders are 1/4-inch steel plate 6-by-6 minimum, dry-set on hydraulic cement if the pocket is spalled.
Foundation crack sealing on the industrial-corridor block walls west of Downtown Gastonia uses SikaFlex-1a polyurethane sealant for hairline cracks and Sika Sikadur 32 Hi-Mod LPL epoxy injection for larger stable cracks that need structural bonding, always after the exterior water source has been addressed with grading and downspout extensions. Subfloor patches use 3/4-inch T&G plywood sheathing let into the existing plane, glued and screwed with GRK RSS structural screws. Brick pier shoring at the pre-1930s Downtown Gastonia and Loray Mill area houses is Tiger SmartJack or Grip-Tite adjustable steel posts on new poured pads, sometimes permanent, sometimes as temporary shoring while a mason rebuilds the brick pier with proper mortar and a real footing. HMI TerraThane 24024 polyurethane foam gets specified for any interior slab lift on partial-crawl-partial-slab houses in the newer stock, injected through 5/8-inch ports and cured before liner goes down. Every repair scope closes with encapsulation over the repaired framing so what we just fixed does not rot again.
Yes — Gastonia is a regular crawlspace repair route. Free on-site inspection anywhere in Gastonia, fixed written quote before we touch anything.
Gastonia crawl repair is heavier on girder rot and joist sistering than most metro submarkets because so many 40s to 70s Franklin Blvd and Union Rd ranches have gone forty years without any moisture control and the wood has been quietly losing cross-section the entire time.
28052, 28054, 28056. All Gaston County addresses covered.
Almost never a replacement. Bouncy floors on the 40s to 70s Franklin Blvd and Union Rd ranch belt are usually one of three things: a sagging girder that has lost bearing on a mid-span pier, joists that have been softened by moisture at the block pockets where they bear, or an original subfloor that was undersized for the current live load. All three are repairable. Girder issues get shoring plus either sistering or full replacement of the affected span depending on how far the rot has gone. Joist end rot gets a steel bearing plate at the pocket and a sister joist to carry the load. Undersized subfloor gets an overlay or a strategic replacement of the worst sheets. I will crawl the full footprint on the free inspection, probe the suspect wood with a screwdriver, run a level down the girder, and tell you what your house actually needs. Photos included in the written quote.
Probably not structural repair, but you may need crack sealing and exterior water management. A lot of the housing stock west of Downtown Gastonia and near the FUSE District area sits on soil that was graded and filled during the mill era and the early 1900s rail work. Stair-step cracks in that setting are usually from settlement that happened twenty or thirty years ago and stopped. Real fresh movement shows fresh mortar dust at the crack, spalled edges on the block, and cracks that get visibly wider between visits. If yours have been the same width for years, they are stable. You have a water intrusion path, not an active failure. Real fix is exterior grading and gutter management to stop water reaching the wall, plus interior crack sealing with SikaFlex-1a or an epoxy injection for larger cracks. If I think you need a structural engineer, I will tell you on the inspection and I will not quote the interior work until an engineer has signed off.
Yes, but the honest answer is often that shimming is a temporary fix on a pier that needs to be shored or rebuilt properly. The pre-1930s mill houses near Downtown Gastonia and the Loray Mill area have shallow brick pier foundations, sometimes on tamped dirt with no real footing at all. Cedar wedges hammered under the sag might buy a couple of years but the pier is still sitting on inadequate bearing and will move again. Real fix is a Tiger SmartJack or Grip-Tite adjustable steel column on a new poured pad at proper Gaston County code footing depth, transferring the load off the failing brick pier onto the steel. From there we either leave the SmartJack permanently or have a mason rebuild the brick pier with proper mortar and a real footing and remove the SmartJack once the new pier is cured. Depends on scope, budget, and how many piers are affected.
Yes for structural work. Girder replacement, joist sistering across a substantial footprint, subfloor patching of any real size, adding a new load path or changing an existing one — all of that requires a Gaston County building permit and inspection. We pull those as part of the scope. The permit adds a couple of days to the front end but it protects you on resale (buyers' inspectors always ask about permit history on structural work) and on any insurance claim down the road. Encapsulation itself is not a permitted trade in Gaston County — vapor barrier, sealed vents, dehumidifier — none of that needs a permit. Dedicated 20-amp circuit for the dehumidifier or a sump pump falls under a Gaston County electrical permit and we pull that too. Any contractor who tells you the whole encapsulation needs a permit is padding. Ask them what section of the code.
Free on-site Gastonia inspection. Fixed written quote. Call (980) 227-1769 or book below.