The grade should ideally slope gradually away from the house so that the surface water runs off before being absorbed into the soil near your walls. The best spot for a home is a knoll from which land slopes away in all directions A gentle slope toward the road or street is good, but water will slope toward the home in the back. If water runs across the site or down toward the house, drainage problems will occur. If water settles and doesn’t run off at all, drainage problems will also occur. These can be fixed in a variety of ways, with the installation of a simple French drain which intercepts the water and channels it to an appropriate discharge area or with swales which are relatively inexpensive and very effective.

If you want to know more about grade problems and how they can be fixed see Section C in The Home Waterproofers Manual – Home Waterproofing A to Z for explainations and illustrations. . Once they are explained, grade problems make common sense. What looks like a very serious and expensive problem with water reaching the walls, may not be. However, remember, if there’s a cheap way to fix the problem, most waterproofing salesmen won’t tell you, because they make their profit as a percentage of the sale and don’t consider it their job to save you money. Diverting the water away from your walls is usually inexpensive and there’s no money in that. Don’t put yourself at the mercy of high priced waterproofers.

You can save thousands of dollars and many headaches by learning what is going on first. Often what looks like an expensive and serious problem may not be. Once the problem is explained, solving it is just common sense. I’ve used the knowledge I’ve put in The Home Waterproofers Manual – Home Waterproofing A to Z every day to fix water problems. It will work for you too.

But remember, when dealing with salesmen, in the waterproofing business it’s “buyer beware”. Most get a percentage of the sale and don’t consider it their job to save you money. They charge as much as they can. If they see a problem that can be fixed at low cost, or one that has a simple solution, they won’t mention it, but will only talk about “preventing serious damage” and try to scare you into signing a big contract.