It's important for your home to stay as dry as possible so you can avoid water damage, mold, and pests. If water seeps into your basement from the outside, you'll need to have your home waterproofed. A residential exterior waterproofing contractor will evaluate your property and determine the best way to keep water from getting into your home. This often involves the use of a wall membrane and drain. Here's how exterior waterproofing works.

Exterior Waterproofing Blocks Water

You can have interior waterproofing done too, but interior methods deal with water once it's already making its way into your basement. A popular interior method is to use a sump pump to get rid of water, but if the pump fails for some reason, your basement could still flood.

Exterior waterproofing prevents this problem by blocking water so it can't leak through gaps or seep through concrete. This ensures your home will stay dry since water is blocked on the exterior side of the foundation walls.

Exterior Waterproofing Often Uses Two Methods

Your contractor may use both a wall coating and a buried drain since the two work together. With a coating on the wall, water hits the wall and rolls to the ground. If a drain is buried there, the water is then routed away from your house. Moving water away from your house is an essential step in waterproofing and, in some cases, your contractor might opt to use a drain by itself. However, when a drain and membrane are combined, you have the best chance of keeping your basement dry, and that's important when you want to convert your basement into a living area or if you just want to protect your home by keeping it dry.

Exterior Waterproofing Requires Excavation

A residential exterior waterproofing contractor plans out the best way to install the membrane and drain. This requires digging up the soil beside your house to uncover the entire basement wall all the way to the footings of your house. Besides that, the contractor needs a trench to bury the drain, and the trench needs to be lower than your house so water falls into the drain before reaching your foundation.

This can be a disruptive process, but once it's done you shouldn't have to worry about water getting inside your house since the membrane or coating on the wall is permanent. Exterior home waterproofing is invisible once the work is complete and the landscape is replaced. The membrane is hidden by soil and the drain is deep under the ground. 

For more information, contact a home exterior waterproofing contractor near you.