Why basement floors sink in a city with almost no shade
Basement slabs sit deeper in the ground than any other concrete on your property, and in most of the metro that depth buys some protection from the weather. Aurora is the exception. With open lots and little tree cover, drought years pull moisture out of the plains clay to a surprising depth. The clay shrinks as it dries, drops away from the underside of the basement slab, and leaves the floor spanning a gap you'll never see. You notice the results instead: a dip along one wall, a crack tracing the expansion joint, a floor drain that has somehow become the high point of the room.
We fix it without opening up the floor. Mudjacking works through 1-1/2" holes drilled in the slab, spaced every 4 to 6 feet across the settled area. The slurry goes in, fills the shrink gap, and raises the floor back to flat. Finished basements stay finished. Nobody carries rubble up your stairs, and Trevor will tell you at the estimate how long the job takes.
The question we answer before we quote anything
Is it the floor, or is it the foundation? In a basement that distinction is worth thousands of dollars, so it's where every one of our estimates starts. A settled floor slab is our job. Foundation walls on the move are an engineer's job, and we won't pump a dollar of slurry until we know which one you have. Cracks climbing the foundation wall in steps, interior doors that no longer latch, window frames starting to bind: those signs send us back to the truck and you to a structural engineer, with no invoice from us. Most of the time, though, the walls are sound and the floor simply followed the shrinking clay down. That one we fix.
Aurora's storm season reaches the basement too
The hail-alley downpours that hammer roofs here saturate the ground fast, and water that can't soak into baked clay runs along foundation walls looking for a way down. When it finds one, it can carve soil out from under the basement slab on its way through. So Aurora basements get hit from both directions: drought shrink opens gaps in the dry years, storm water scours them wider in the wet ones. If we spot active water during the estimate, we'll tell you to solve the drainage first or alongside the lift, because pumping slurry into a pocket that's still being carved out is treating the symptom. Sunken concrete and water damage tend to arrive as a pair.
The numbers, and what you skip by lifting
Basement floor lifts are priced by the area that moved and the size of the gap underneath, quoted free and in person. The alternative is breaking out the slab inside your house: demolition, hauling, repour, new flooring, and weeks of disruption at two to three times the cost. A few things about how we work indoors:
- We tarp the route from the door to the work area before the first hole gets drilled
- The mix is water and sandy loam soil. It cures inert, with no foam chemistry and nothing to off-gas into the room
- Carpet or tile over the lift area comes up first; bare concrete needs no prep at all
- Patched holes take carpet, tile, epoxy, or plank flooring once they cure
Winter is the easy season for this one
Basement lifts are indoor work, which makes them one of the few concrete repairs January can't slow down. The slurry cures fine in the cold and the crew stays out of the weather, so the off-season is often the easiest time to book. If the floor has bothered you all year, don't wait for spring to call about it.
Trevor walks every basement himself before we quote: level on the floor, steel rod tapping for hidden gaps, eyes on the walls. You get a straight answer about which problem you have and a written number if it's one we fix. Call (303) 526-2222 or request the free estimate and get the real answer before you get a bid.