Bob reviews two types of water barriers installed in the basement to prevent water intrusion. The water barriers block moisture that comes through the walls and channel it into a perimeter drainage system in the floor. Larry Janesky of Basement Systems reviews the WaterGuard system and explains how the pipes are set to a proper elevation by backfilling with crushed stone. Pitching the pipes makes the water drain into a sump hole where it can be pumped out of the home. Janesky shows Bob the WaterGuard ports that open into the embedded channels for inspection or cleaning, and provide a drainage outlet for the dehumidifier. Janesky then reviews the TripleSafe Sump Pump and how it works to pump collected water out of the home. The system uses three pumps to minimize the risk of flooding by pump failure. The primary pump has a secondary backup pump in case the it fails or becomes overloaded. Both pumps are hardwired into the home's electrical system. Each pump has its own discharge pipes so that the system will not be overloaded by increased demand. A third pump is battery-operated in case of power failure. An alarm sounds when the battery-driven pump kicks in to alert the homeowner so that power can be restored before the battery runs down. IceGuard fittings have been put on the discharge pipes outside so that water will clear the home even if the underground discharge pipes are frozen.

Foundation repairs are expensive; help avoid major problems in the future by doing a regular checkup on your home. Inspect foundation walls for cracks; these can be caused by settling, expanding tree roots, or improper drainage. Inspect and clean out your gutters regularly and be sure that the drains direct water away from the foundation.

Larry Janesky of Basement Systems reviews the work being done to cut a drainage trench in the concrete around the perimeter of the basement floor. Water will be channelled through the trench to a sump, where it can be pumped out of the home. The sump hole was dug at the lowest spot in the basement as determined by laser level. CleanSpace is being installed over the walls as a vapor barrier to drain water from the walls to the drainage system. It is possible to install CleanSpace in crawlspaces as well as in basements to prevent water buildup in underground walls and eliminate rot and mildew. Janesky recommends taking these two steps in securing the drainage of a home and to secure against all outside air leaks. The final step is to dehumidify the crawlspace. Janesky points out a corner of the basement where the Thermal Dry Wall System has been installed. This product goes behind finished walls and drains water like CleanSpace but also reflects heat generated in the basement back into the basement. Janesky then shows a portion of the floor where the Water Guard Drainage System has been installed in the drainage trench and secured with cement.

Here's another great tip from BobVila.com. Falling prices are good news if you re house-hunting, but now, more than ever, buyer beware. Most sellers just aren t motivated to do expensive repairs in this market, so problems sometimes get painted over or hidden, and it s up to you to find them. Your best bet is to hire a certified home inspector. If you get a recommendation from your realtor, check references; you want an independent and unbiased opinion. Your inspector should look at the house thoroughly with you and give you a written assessment of the house s condition from top to bottom, including windows, doors, trim, siding, roof and chimneys. It should include an assessment of the building s structure and mention any signs of settling or instability. It should cover the siting of the house on the lot and tell you if there are any drainage issues you should be worried about. And it should give you an idea of the age and safety of all the mechanical systems in the house and whether anything is unsafe or needs to be replaced. The inspector s report gives you leverage to negotiate a lower price, have repairs made before closing or back out if you don t want to deal with serious problems. Depending on where you live, whom you hire and how long the inspection takes, the report will cost you anywhere from $200 to $700, but it can save you thousands. It s definitely money well spent. Find out more at BobVila.com: The ultimate home improvement web site! BobVila.com 2008

Bob talks with Howard Brickman about the challenging soil conditions on this project, where a high water table and impermeable soils must be considered for the foundation. To alleviate these problems, several tons of inch-and-a-half crushed stone were trucked to the job site. The footings for the foundation were placed to support the load-bearing walls. Waterproof Fab-Form plastic footing forms were used instead of typical wood forms because they will keep the water out and away from the footings. A plastic membrane was placed on the inside of the Fab-Forms to further protect the footings from water. The forms are connected and braced for the pour with stakes that are screwed into the forms with threaded wallboard screws. When the stakes are removed, the screws will be snapped off. Using this method has removed two of three steps in the standard footing construction process. The forms double as the drainage-pipe material and will stay in place after the pour, eliminating the need to remove the forms once the concrete is set. In a typcial footing pour, the forms would be stripped away from the footings before the drain pipe was placed. With Fab-Forms the slab and the footing with integral drainage can be poured at the same time, using a smaller footing than traditional installations.

Bob joins Wes Lohr of Lohr Construction as they install the deck framing and deck on one of the Mashpee, Massachusetts houses. The footings are poured and the deck posts are set in place with high-density plastic feet to repel moisture. The frame is being built with pressure-treated lumber, which no longer poses health risks as it once did. They look at the ledger board that is spaced 3/4 to one inch away from the house to allow for drainage and to avoid snow buildup. Lohr installs the ledger board with a six-inch lag bolt that will go through the board and into the sill plate of the house. The joist hangers are already in place on the ledger board, and the frame is completed with a base board that is mitered at the corners and fastened all the way around the deck. The first piece of composite decking is notched to go around the deck posts. They have chosen a grain pattern for this WeatherBest composite decking, which gives a wood-look appearance to the deck. The decking boards are spaced one 16-penny spike apart for proper drainage and are pre-drilled to receive the colored screws that match the decking. The base of the deck will be painted in a year, once it has dried sufficiently.

The new family room is all done and furnished and looks terrrific. Bob talks with Sarah Monzon, the homeowner who also acted as the general contractor on the project, about the remodeling work done on the room. The room was a "cave" according to Monzon before the project was started. A pitted soapstone sink was previously used as a laundry and had become an eyesore. The room was also cluttered with accumulated junk. Because of the shortage of space in the house, the family decided to finish the basement to add to the living space of the home. Monzon acted as the general contractor for the project because there wasn't money budgeted for the expense, which was not necessarily an experience she would choose to repeat. The local inspectional services department provided a large amount of information for the novice general contractor. It is imperative before homeowners do any work on their home that they obtain the necessary permits and find out what is safe and what is not. If homeowners do work on their homes without a permit and anything goes wrong, insurance will not cover the damage. Before any work was done on the house, the basement floors were concrete and heating ducts crisscrossed the ceiling. There was flooding damage in the basement during the past fall which needed to be corrected and prevented in the future. Basement Systems was called in to install a perimeter drain and drainage system. A lot of existing plumbing was then moved from the ceiling to make more headspace and a new HVAC system was installed to move the heating ducts. The new central air system complete with an air filter made the house much more livable. In one of the smaller spaces in the basement, a new bathroom was installed with the help of technology from Saniflo. Owens Corning Basement Finishing Systems was then called in to install new finished walls. Many of the mechanical devices in the basement are now hidden behind the walls but are still accessible as the walls can be easily removed. A new entertainment center was then installed in the finished basement featuring a S1 Digital Media Center. The media center allows the homeowner to browse digital pictures taken using the family's digital camera or to set the image as wallpaper for the screen. Television shows can be watched or recorded using a schedule guide. The media center also can store home videos, movies, and music. New reclining chairs from Bell'O were put in the entertainment room. When laying protection from flood damage in a basement, it is important to elevate wood from the concrete floor. Instead of using a plywood underlayment, a plastic tile system was used which interlocks and can be screwed down onto the concrete. Plastic webbing underneath the tiles diverts any water which may come up through the concrete or spill in the basement to the perimeter drain. Slide-Lok cabinets were put in the basement to increase storage space. The Slide-Lok wall system was put in place to hang tools in the workspace. The husband of the family is a musician and uses much of the storage space to hold his instruments. Because the room can double as rehearsal space, two and a half inches of fiberglass are in the walls to reduce sound transmission to the outside. The basement has a small office space for the husband as well. Accents throughout the space correlate with other things in the room. The lampshades on the desk have a design which relates to the flooring product. The floor does not have a wall-to-wall carpet although it looks as if it does. The floor is from Binvetec and features tiles of carpet which stick to the floor. The product has interlocking patterns which can easily be layed down. Bean bags from Sumo were put in the room for lounging in and the kids love to play on them. A stairwell fishtank from AquaVista is only four inches deep.

At the modular home site in the Berkshires in Western Massachusetts Bob meets with Michael Shiels to discuss the backfilling of the Superior Walls basement foundation system. Due to excessive rain, dry sand was trucked in to provide a medium for the drainage of water away from the home�s foundation. Outside the front door a deck is beginning to take shape. Concrete columns for the base of the porch pergola have been poured and anchored four and a half feet into the ground to prevent frost heaves.

Bob meets Bob Bevilacqua at the River Hill site in Mashpee, Massachusetts, where Bevilacqua and his crew have undertaken a mammoth job of earth moving as they cleared and prepared the site for eleven new homes. First they cleared the four-acre parcel of trees, stumps, and brush, before stripping, screening, and storing the top soil in a mound for later use. It will be used later in the project for road shoulders and finish landscaping. RJ Bevilacqua Construction has also cut in the road for blacktop, stripping the clay underneath and relocating it to the drainage basin they are preparing near the back of the development. A retention area is created to catch runoff from the road, where storm drains collect the water and send it through a sediment field to catch any oil or sediment from the water before before it passes to an overflow basin. About 3,000 yards of fill will be used to create the slope and basin for the retention and runoff area. The goal is to reuse all of the earth that has been moved on the site as fill once the finish work begins. The roadbed is another example of reuse, and is built of recycled concrete and asphalt from a demolished roadway.

Bob Vila shows a Victorian Style house where the rough plumbing is being installed. The house has a half basement with the remainder being just crawlspace. Bob meets Jim Timino the plumbing contractor who is running PVC pipe for the rough plumbing. Jim is installing a 2" waste line from the kitchen that will run to the main waste stack or piping. The main waste piping is 4" PVC and it runs into the sewer system in the backyard. Jim demonstrates how to properly cement or glue PVC fittings with the PVC pipe. They also take a look at the master bedroom suite, which will be magnificent because of its roominess and the extravagant master bathroom. They show the vent piping from the basement to the roof including a future vent that is required by Massachusetts Plumbing Code. The vent pipes allow proper drainage as well as a place for sewer gas to be expelled outside of the home. Bob tours the upstairs children�s bedrooms and overviews the header vent pipe and how it interconnects all the waste pipes in the home.