Foundation installation in Monrovia CA - a base matched to your lot and soil

You're probably planning a new house, adding on or replacing a foundation that's past saving, and you want to know what you're getting into. The price mostly turns on which type your lot calls for, how much the ground slopes, what the soil report finds and how big the footprint is. The schedule turns more on testing and permits than on the pour itself. If you already know you want a slab, our slab foundation building page covers that one in more depth. For your own number, I walk the lot, measure it and write down what's included, like removal and hauling, so you know what the price covers.

We build from the engineer's plans and the soil report, so nothing gets dug until both are in hand. On a sloped lot I talk through slab or raised floor with you first, because that choice decides how much dirt moves and what you end up paying. Then our crew lays out the footprint, digs to the depth the plans call for and packs the subgrade, the soil the foundation sits on, hard, because loose dirt settles and takes the concrete with it. Before we pour, I settle where the water will run, since most failed concrete I've torn out had water sitting where it shouldn't. We set rebar, the steel inside that holds the concrete together when the ground shifts, and on a slab we set anchor bolts around the edge during the pour to tie the bottom board of your walls to the foundation. Then it cures, the wait while the concrete gains strength, before framing goes on top.

Every foundation sits on concrete footings, the wider concrete below ground that spreads the weight into firmer soil, and we also pour those on their own for porches, walls and small additions. If you're putting up a shop or building on a lot that also needs paving, we can handle the concrete parking lot building too, so one crew sets the grades and the water runs off both the same way.

In Monrovia, the paperwork for this job starts with grading. The city's Engineering Department takes written grading permit applications, and the plans that go with one are drawn by a registered civil engineer unless the city engineer approves otherwise. New construction on an infill hillside lot also needs a hillside development permit from the Planning Commission. What your address needs isn't something I'll guess at, so we check with the city or county office that covers it before we set a date, and if the job needs a permit, we sort out who pulls it and have it in hand before work starts.

Plenty of lots here slope toward the foothills, so we spend more time on the slab-or-raised talk and on where runoff goes once the house is up. We see the same kind of hillside lots on jobs in Sierra Madre and Pasadena. As for the state's seismic hazard zone rules, the California Geological Survey's seismic hazard zones page says a single-family frame home up to two stories is exempt from those state requirements when it isn't part of a development of four or more units. Local agencies can be stricter, so we go by what the city tells us for your lot.