Regan-Matonak & Associates

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See services performed. Phone call.

We had a contractor in to do floor levelling after pulling up carpet and tile to discover a large crack front-to-back through the entire house where the north end of the house had sunk by 3and quot;. I asked the contractor if he thought I should consult with a structural engineer. He gave me the name and number of Regan, Matonak, and Associates. I dealt directly with Dan Matonak who assessed the structure and original problem. He also walked around the entire house and found an additional problem! He saw that the brick was bowing about 3/4and quot; inch at the back. The upper level of the house is open at ground level to the back yard, while the lower level opens at ground level to the front yard. In other words, the back of the house is in a hill. His assessment was that the bowing was caused by inward deflection of cinder block wall at about 30and quot; below ground level, without even seeing the cinder block. He said and quot;If you remove that wood panelling, I think you'll find cinder block and I think you'll also find a 1/8and quot; or so horizontal crack going along the entire back walland quot;. He was completely correct! I had to hire another company to do repair work on the back wall. We went with carbon fiber strips with epoxy adhesive to repair the back wall (and quot;The Reinforcer, Steven Jaymes contractorsand quot;). And then I re-insulated and put back up and painted the wood paneling. The original job was to ask about the floor leveling. He said that the crack wasn't that big of a deal, but that the large chunks of limestone, cinder block and broken brick found underneath an existing floor indicated that the concrete slab has been poured incorrectly and that there were voids. Also, he recommended an engineering firm, Triad Engineering, to do a geo-technical assessment of the dirt under the foundation for stablity. When that was complete he recommended 2 different possibilities for solution to the problem. One involved underpinnings which would be a permanent but expensive fix to dig out 4' sections all along under the existing footer and install a new 12x12 footer. The second was to dig a trench at the front and insulate the existing footer and foundation to prevent frost heave. We did the latter and he worked with the labor firm, Miller Home Improvement (see review - highly recommend), to do the work. All of this for just a little bit of money!