Plumbing in Old Homes: Importance of Sewer Inspection Before Buying a House

Buying a new home is an exciting part of life. However, it is essential to keep your head clear and be diligent in the buying process. When people consider buying a home, they usually have some inspections done before purchasing the house.

Inspections for mold, structural components, and large appliances help the buyer understand the house's condition before they make that big commitment to buy. Inspecting the ventilation, insulation, and HVAC ensures that the buyer and their family will be comfortable once they move in. However, sewer inspection is a necessary process that often gets no consideration.

Sewer lines don’t get much attention because they’re underground and out of sight. An older home’s sewer line could be several decades old and on the verge of collapse. At King’s Services, the top sewer and drain cleaning professionals in Winnipeg, MB, we know the importance of sewer inspection and how it can save you a lot of money and headaches.

The Importance of Sewer Inspection

Without an inspection of the sewer line and the plumbing under the house, you’re taking a large and unnecessary risk. While an inspection of a sewer line is a low-cost service, the repairs you could face without it can be extremely pricey. If you’re a first-time buyer, don’t make a deal with a seller without having a professional check the sewer line.

Damaged sewers don’t always require the replacement of a pipe. Cracks in the pipe, caused by tree roots or other underground agitators, can lead to more expensive professional labor. 

If you’re sewer pipe bursts under your property, causing the sewer system to backflow into your cellar, you’ll soon be dealing with flood issues and foundation repairs. Additionally, if a tree’s roots wrap around and strangle the sewer pipe, causing it to burst, you’ll need someone to remove the roots or, perhaps, the entire tree. Your sewer line may lay beneath your driveway, which will require pulling up and replacing the asphalt or concrete.

These additional services can take a repair bill from hundreds of dollars into the thousands.

Sewer Scope Inspection Process

A sewer scope inspection is the best process for analyzing the sewer line beneath a house. The inspector runs a borescope camera into a drain and through the sewage line. The camera sits on the end of a long, snake-like wire as it slides through the piping.

The camera relays images to a monitor so the inspector can spot cracks in the piping, leaks in the connections, or blockages. The inspection process takes up to an hour at most. When the inspection is complete, the inspector will record their findings and supply you and the house’s seller with copies of the final report.

Cause of Sewer Line Blockage

Some sewer lines will last beyond their timespan of expectation with no issues. Sewer lines don’t rely on air or water pressure to do their job. They simply run water and waste from your home to your city’s sewer system through the use of gravity.

The lack of pressure in the pipes means that the sewer line goes through less wear and tear than the plumbing in your house. Drain systems have a balance of air and water pressure that enables water to travel through the pipes. This causes leaks at connection points where one pipe meets another.

Since sewer lines use a more passive system to transport water and waste materials, some home inspectors don’t bother to check them. A blockage in a sewer line can become an expensive problem if it is left to worsen. The most common reasons for sewer line blockage are:

Tree Roots

The most common cause of sewer line blockage is tree roots. The water and waste flowing through the pipeline contain nutrients for trees, which attract the roots as they grow. If a root works its way into a crack in the pipe, it will create a blockage as it grows.

Removing a tree root for the sewer line is not typically an expensive or time-consuming procedure. A plumber can spot a tree root blockage during a sewer scope inspection.

Improper Installation

While the sewer line was under construction, workers may have cut corners. Doing so often results in unreliable sewage lines. Improper connections between the pipe, the wrong joints, or overly tight angles will result in eventual problems.

Fortunately, these issues are easy to detect with a camera scope.

Ground Shift

 If the sewer line installation was perfect, the line might still detach or lose slope because of shifting in the ground. For example, the ground may shift or settle due to seismic occurrences, underground water changes, or excavation near the property.

A ground shift blockage to a sewer pipe can be one of the most expensive to repair. The problem often requires large digging equipment and labor. Sewer line inspection can help to find evidence of ground shift before it becomes problematic.

Archaic Material Used for Piping

This is a common concern for people looking to buy an older home. Old homes’ sewer lines often have primitive piping that consists of concrete or clay tiling. This archaic piping is frail and susceptible to cracking and root damage.

Modern homes use heavy-duty plastic piping for the sewer line. A simple scope inspection will reveal the kind of pipe the sewage line has.

Pipe Settling

If the sewer line sits in a trench without proper support, it will begin to sink and make low points in the line. When this happens, water and waste material will stagnate in the low points, eventually creating blockages.

Unfortunately, this issue can be expensive to fix. In this case, professionals must dig up, remove, and reposition the sewer line. Sewer inspection is the only way to spot this problem before it worsens.

Sewer Inspection Service

Click the link to learn about common plumbing problems in old homes, and call King’s Services at 204-815-5877 to schedule a sewer inspection or for any of your plumbing needs in the Winnipeg, MB area!