subject: Are Building Foundation Cracks Really That Big of a Problem? - Listen to the Experts [print this page] Are Building Foundation Cracks Really That Big of a Problem? - Listen to the Experts
If you've ever read the holy Bible you have probably heard the story that you need to build your home on a rock rather than loose sandy soil. This might not be the case with a building foundation, but let's see if we can get to the bottom of this, literally. Smaller cracks aren't going to be as big of a problem as larger ones, but don't forget that smaller foundation cracks can get bigger.
If you have small hairline cracks in your building foundation, usually this won't become a problem unless they start to expand and get larger. A good example of a hairline building foundation crack would be to draw a line on a piece of paper with a pen or pencil. A hairline crack isn't going to be any bigger than the width of a regular pencil line.
If the building foundation has structural reinforcing Rebar installed within the footings and the building foundation slab itself, these cracks and usually won't get larger. The rebar will actually hold these areas together and provide additional strength for the homes foundation.
Now what about larger cracks in your foundation, could these be a problem. The first thing we need to do is to evaluate the size of the cracks and make sure that they're not getting larger. You can do this by taking a picture of the crack and then regularly taking pictures of these cracks annually to make sure that they're not getting larger and it wouldn't be a bad idea to measure them in the picture itself.
Foundation cracks are common in home construction and to give you a brief summary, if the foundation cracks are small, you might not have a problem, but if they're big, wider than a quarter of an inch, you could have a problem. Cracks that are wider than a half-inch could mean serious problems.
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