If your floors sag, bounce, or slope, the fix isn't a new floor — it's what's holding it up. We install adjustable steel support jacks on concrete footings, sister rotted joists, and replace failing girders where they've given out.
A licensed local crew — usually out in 24 to 72 hours. Written scope, fixed price, no pressure.
Structural support work in SouthPark is dominated by two failure modes on the 1960s brick-ranch stock in Beverly Woods, Foxcroft, and Barclay Downs: brick pier settlement into original 1960s footings poured on fill soil, and girder decay from 60 years of humid crawl air condensing on cold wood. Both show up as floor deflection above — bouncy floors, sloping rooms, doors that will not close square, and the occasional interior crack propagating up from a settled bearing wall. Last month I got called to a 1966 ranch on Colony Rd where the owner had noticed a 3/4-inch gap opening between the top of an interior door frame and the finished trim over the course of a year. Under the house I found what I expected — two brick piers under the interior bearing wall had settled 1-1/8 inches into fill soil that had consolidated over 60 years, and the girder above them had followed the piers down. We jacked the girder with hydraulic bottle jacks on cribbing, pulled the piers apart, poured new 24-by-24-by-12-inch concrete footings on undisturbed soil below the fill layer, rebuilt the piers with new brick and full mortar joints, shimmed the girder back to level, and the door frame closed square within a week as the framing above readjusted. Mecklenburg building permit through CityInspect.charlottenc.gov, inspection passed, structural engineer's stamped drawing on file for the jacking sequence.
The other structural pattern I see in SouthPark is on the 1990s teardown-rebuild houses on Colony Rd, Sharon Rd, and the Foxcroft grid infill — steel adjustable columns installed by the original builder in the mid-1990s that are now showing rust-through at the base plate where 20-plus years of humid crawl air have attacked the ferrous steel. Those columns are still bearing load structurally but the base plates are failing, and replacement with new Tiger SmartJack or Grip-Tite adjustable steel columns on fresh concrete pads is a standard scope on the 1998-era rebuilds when I inspect them. Different housing era, different failure mode, same underlying structural repair sequence.
Every SouthPark structural job starts with self-leveling laser mapping across the entire floor system. I set up a Bosch GRL 400H on a tripod in the middle of the crawl, shoot elevation at each joist bay and at every column and pier location, and map the load path from ridge down through walls, girders, columns, and footings to soil. On a 1960s Beverly Woods brick ranch the map typically shows 1/2 to 1-1/4 inches of settlement at the interior bearing wall piers, with the deflection concentrated over the girder line. On a 1998 Colony Rd rebuild the map typically shows 1/4 to 3/4 inches of settlement at any failed steel columns, with less overall deflection because the modern floor system is stiffer.
Every column bearing, girder splice, and joist end gets probed for rot and crushing before we commit to a repair plan. Rotted framing at a bearing point is a common miss — the sagging is treated as settlement and the contractor jacks the pier back to level without addressing the crushed wood above it, which recompresses within a season. On a Beverly Woods ranch where the girder above the settled pier has 20 to 30 percent cross-section loss from decay, the repair sequence has to include girder sistering before or during the pier reset. On a Colony Rd rebuild where a failed steel column has been slowly walking down through a rusted-through base plate, the joist and girder above are usually undamaged and the repair is column replacement only.
Pier reset sequence on a 1960s SouthPark ranch: jack the girder above the affected pier with hydraulic bottle jacks staged on cribbing at points 4 to 6 feet on either side of the pier, taking the load off the pier slowly and evenly. Pull the pier apart brick by brick from the top down, exposing the original footing. Verify the footing is on fill or on undisturbed soil — if on fill, excavate down to the undisturbed clay layer (typically another 6 to 12 inches below the fill), pour a new 24-by-24-by-12-inch concrete footing with #4 rebar at 3,000 PSI, cure 24 hours minimum. Rebuild the pier with new modular brick and full mortar joints on Type S mortar, shim the top course to full contact with the girder using pressure-treated cedar shims, remove the bottle jacks and cribbing. Total time per pier reset with new footing is 2 to 3 working days including cure time.
Column replacement on a 1990s Colony Rd rebuild is faster because the existing footing is usually salvageable — 1990s builders typically poured proper concrete pads for the steel columns and the pad itself has not failed, only the column base plate. We jack the girder with a hydraulic bottle jack, remove the failed column, verify the pad condition, install a new Tiger SmartJack or Grip-Tite adjustable steel column on the existing pad with a fresh Simpson strap connection to the girder, and adjust the column to bring the girder back to level. Total time per column replacement is 1 working day.
Pier reconstruction on a SouthPark 1960s ranch uses modular clay brick matched as closely as possible to the original for visual consistency, laid on Type S mortar with full mortar joints. New footings are 24-by-24-by-12-inch minimum, poured 3,000 PSI ready-mix concrete with #4 rebar tied in a 12-inch grid, cured 24 hours before pier reconstruction begins. Freeze depth in Mecklenburg is 6 to 8 inches and code requires 12 inches minimum footing depth — we pour 18 inches below finished grade on new footings to give margin, and we verify the pour is on undisturbed soil below any fill layer by hand-probing the excavation before the pour. Girder shim stock at the pier top is pressure-treated cedar or PT southern yellow pine, cut to full contact and driven with a rubber mallet until snug.
Column replacements on 1990s SouthPark rebuilds use Tiger SmartJack adjustable steel columns or Grip-Tite adjustable posts, both rated for 30,000-pound capacity for residential loads. Base plate is a factory-welded 6-by-6-by-3/8-inch steel plate that sits on the existing concrete pad with a mortar bed for full contact. Top plate is factory-welded and connects to the girder with a Simpson H2.5A hurricane tie or equivalent Simpson framing connector. The column is adjusted by threaded rod at the top or bottom depending on model, and adjusted to bring the girder back to design elevation as verified by laser.
Girder sistering below 20 percent cross-section loss uses pressure-treated Southern yellow pine 2x10 or 2x12 sistered to the original with 1/2-inch galvanized through-bolts on 16-inch centers and PL Premium structural adhesive at the interface. Above 20 percent loss we go to LVL sistering — Georgia-Pacific or Weyerhaeuser 1-3/4 by 9-1/2 or 11-7/8 LVL bolted through the existing girder with 1/2-inch structural bolts. LVL work requires a stamped structural engineer's drawing and a Mecklenburg building permit. Joist sistering, when required, uses pressure-treated 2x8 or 2x10 to match the original member, bolted through with 1/2-inch galvanized bolts at 16-inch centers with structural adhesive. All permits pulled through CityInspect.charlottenc.gov for the Mecklenburg jurisdiction covering Beverly Woods, Foxcroft, Barclay Downs, and the original SouthPark grid.
Yes — SouthPark is a regular structural support route. Free on-site inspection anywhere in SouthPark, fixed written quote before we touch anything.
SouthPark structural support work is dominated by 1960s brick-pier settlement into fill-soil footings in Beverly Woods and Foxcroft, plus rust-through failure of 1990s builder-installed steel columns on the Colony Rd and Sharon Rd teardown-rebuilds — two housing eras, two failure modes, both requiring engineered structural repair with Mecklenburg permit.
28210, 28211, 28226. All Mecklenburg County addresses covered.
It is almost certainly structural on that housing stock, and the 3/4-inch gap is a specific tell. Doors sticking and gapping in a 1960s Beverly Woods ranch means the framing above them is moving — either an interior bearing wall pier has settled, a girder has crushed at a bearing point, or a rim joist has decayed to the point that a corner of the house is dropping. All three are fixable, all three need to be diagnosed with a self-leveling laser under the house, and all three require a real structural repair scope not just cosmetic touchup on the door frame. Free on-site inspection with laser mapping and hands-on framing check is where we start.
Yes if the base plate is rusted through. Twenty-five-plus years of humid crawl air in an unencapsulated 1990s SouthPark crawl attacks ferrous steel columns from the base plate up, and the columns you can see with visible rust are usually already compromised at the connection between the column and the pad. The column may still be carrying its load — sometimes the rust has consolidated into a solid corrosion product that continues to bear — but the connection is failing and eventually walks down through the pad. Replacement with a fresh Tiger SmartJack or Grip-Tite on the existing concrete pad is a 1-day scope per column and is well worth doing before it becomes a real deflection issue upstairs.
Depends on scope. Pier resets with new footings and rebuild on the original 1960s Beverly Woods brick construction do not typically require an engineer's stamp — Mecklenburg accepts contractor-designed pier repair on standard residential construction with the building permit alone. LVL girder sistering, full girder replacement, and any repair that changes the load path do require a stamped drawing from a licensed structural engineer. We bring in one of the engineers we work with on those scopes, and the stamped drawing is part of the Mecklenburg permit submission through CityInspect.charlottenc.gov.
A single-pier reset with new footing on a 1960s Beverly Woods or Foxcroft ranch is 2 to 3 working days. Multiple piers or piers plus girder sistering typically runs 4 to 6 working days plus inspection wait. Column replacement on a 1990s Colony Rd rebuild is 1 working day per column. On top of that, the Mecklenburg inspection has to happen after structural work and before the encapsulation liner covers it — typically a 2-to-5-day scheduling window depending on inspector availability. Total from repair start to sealed encapsulation on a typical scope is 2 to 3 weeks calendar time. We coordinate all permit and inspection scheduling as part of the fixed written quote.
Free on-site SouthPark inspection. Fixed written quote. Call (980) 227-1769 or book below.