A Homeowner’s Guide to Fixing Foundation Cracks

Have you spotted cracks around your home, but don’t know what to do? Learn how to fix foundation cracks the right way in our complete guide.

No, we’re not going to give you step-by-step instructions on how to do it. That’s not going to solve the problem.

Foundation cracks typically mean something is going on below the surface, something that’s difficult for homeowners to fix without professional assistance.

The key takeaway: learn to spot different types of cracks and call foundation repair professionals like Indiana Foundation Service for a permanent solution.

1. Drywall Cracks

Your first floor and upper floors are often some of the first places you’ll find foundation cracks.

These cracks are usually in drywall and appear vertically or in a jagged, diagonal pattern stemming from the corners of windows and doors. You might also notice drywall nail pops and ceiling cracks.

Drywall cracks may look cosmetic, but they typically mean your house is settling.

2. Basement Wall Cracks

Your basement walls are also prime spots for cracks.

Concrete block walls typically have horizontal cracks and inward bowing. This means hydrostatic pressure is at work, impacting the wall’s structural integrity.

Poured concrete basement walls can suffer the same fate, but they often have vertical cracks, indicating lateral movement.

3. Floor Cracks

Your concrete floors can crack, whether your home has a basement or a slab foundation.

Thin hairline cracks are typical as concrete cures. However, larger, deeper cracks that spread throughout the slab point to foundation settlement or heaving.

4. Brick Cracks

You might also see brick cracks in your home’s exterior.

They can appear vertically, but you’ll most likely notice them following a stair-step pattern along the mortar joints. Cracks in brick, especially stair-step cracks, mean your foundation has differential settlement (settling at an uneven rate).

5. Cracking and Leaning Chimney

Similarly, your exterior brick chimney can show the same kinds of cracks.

You may also see gaps where it separates from your house and starts leaning away from the rest of the structure. This is a more dramatic and dangerous symptom that could result in your chimney’s collapse.

Soil Composition Challenges

Central Indiana’s soil is predominantly silty loam and silty clay loam, with significant clay content. Clay is an expansive soil that swells when wet and contracts when dry. This continuous movement creates substantial stress on home foundations.

Seasonal Climate Variations

Indiana experiences a humid continental climate with significant temperature fluctuations. These dramatic shifts and freeze-thaw cycles cause concrete expansion and contraction, potentially developing into more substantial foundation cracks.

Precipitation and Drainage Considerations

With more than 40 inches of annual rainfall and the White River flowing through Central Indiana, moisture management is critical. Poor drainage can accelerate foundation degradation and increase crack formation risks.

Our team at Indiana Foundation Service understands that no two homes are the same and that each requires its own unique set of repairs. Following a thorough, free inspection, we may recommend the following solutions:

1. Foundation Piers

We install three types of foundation piers—helical, push, and slab—depending on your foundation type and the extent of the damage.

These methods, also known as underpinning, permanently stabilize and can potentially lift your settling foundation. In doing so, they also offer the opportunity to help close foundation cracks.

2. Crawl Space Jacks

Similarly, our heavy-duty crawl space jacks provide lasting reinforcement to weakened floors and floor joists.

We can adjust them and possibly lift floors to a more level position, thus helping close some cracks on the upper floors.

3. Carbon Fiber Wall Reinforcement

For basement walls with minimal cracking or inward bowing under two inches of displacement, we’ll install durable carbon fiber reinforcement straps along the interior wall surface. We can also fill and seal any visible wall cracks.

While extremely strong, these thin straps are designed to permanently stabilize and prevent any further inward wall movement from occurring. They securely hold compromised foundation walls in their current positions.

However, they do not have the capability to potentially straighten or restore bowing walls back to their original upright position.

4. Wall Braces

For walls with more significant cracking and movement, our innovative IntelliBrace™ system uses heavy-duty galvanized steel beams secured flush against bowing basement walls by a unique floor bracket anchoring method.

Unlike rigid I-beams, the IntelliBrace™ beams feature design adjustability that allows for incremental improvement. Once installed, this system immediately halts any further wall displacement while providing the potential to gradually restore walls and close cracks over time through controlled tightening.

5. Wall Anchors

Similarly, our wall anchor system delivers robust lateral reinforcement for severe foundation wall failure with large cracks and more than two inches of movement.

It consists of interior wall anchor plates connected by steel rods to underground anchors embedded deep in stable soils away from the foundation walls.

Using specialized equipment, crews build tension within the anchor system by tightening the rods, creating powerful opposing forces between the interior and exterior anchors. This stops wall bowing while simultaneously beginning to pull and straighten buckled walls.

6. Channel Anchors

If basement walls exhibit shearing movement or displacement concentrated near the base, channel anchors provide an effective repair solution.

Combining aspects of the IntelliBrace™ system and wall anchors, channel anchors use underground earth anchors connected to interior channel brackets that are floor-mounted. This braces and stabilizes shearing walls while allowing future tightening adjustments to gradually improve wall alignment over time.