You’re patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for your Anchor Foundation Repair project to begin. You have a start date but now . . . *record scratch* . . . things are delayed.
You might be irritated, frustrated, annoyed, angry, or [insert another word that means *not happy* from the thesaurus here] to hear the news that your job will not be starting on time. Why is this happening??
At Anchor Foundation Repair, we have been repairing Brazos Valley foundations since 1985. Try as we might to have all our jobs start on time, delays happen. We’ve had our fair share of delays over the years and can tell you what usually causes them.
In this article, we will review the main reasons an Anchor Foundation Repair job can get delayed. We’ll explain why these delays happen and what we do to get the schedule back on track and your home repaired.
6 Most Common Reasons Anchor Job Starts Are Delayed
Here’s a quick list of the most likely causes of a delayed start in an Anchor repair project:
- Uncooperative Weather,
- Need for Dry Ground,
- Other Jobs Taking Longer Than Expected,
- Waiting on Other Contractors,
- Planning Errors, and
- Optimal Timing for Homeowners.
Don’t worry, we’re going to explain these more, but wanted to give you the shortlist first. Just so you know, we’re not trying to do anything on purpose to make you mad. Sometimes delays happen in the world of foundation repair contractors.
We don’t like delays any more than you do and we don’t like letting our homeowners down. We take scheduling very seriously and the closer we get to your project, the more accurate we can be with project start dates. Sometimes things still get delayed or changed despite our best efforts.
Now, let’s expand on these reasons a bit.
1. Uncooperative Weather
Surely you’ve met our friend *Texas Weather* already. He’s a tricky one and changes his mind as often as the wind blows. (Dang, that was like a pun within a pun or something – is there such a thing as a compound pun? Well, there is now.) Anywhoo, if we have rainy or cold weather (or both at the same time) for several days in a row, it can delay jobs.
We can’t work effectively in the rain and mud on any of our repair service types. Water and foundation repairs don’t mix real well. So we’re not going to show up at job sites, throw some mud around, and not accomplish anything meaningful.
Our team can’t work if it’s extra cold outside either. The guys can handle the regular sort of *barely-winter* Texas cold we get around these parts. But when we have unusually frigid winter storms or icy conditions, like the Snowpocalypse of 2021 or the Christmas Freeze of 2022, we’re not sending our team out in below-freezing temperatures.
We hope that homeowners understand that we can’t control the weather. We will get back to work as soon as we are able. Just keep in mind that weather delays have compounding effects. The bad weather might have happened several weeks before, but it pushes not only the next job back, but it might also impact the job after that, and the job after that.
We’re so sorry when this happens, but we really can’t control the weather, unfortunately. We’d be in a whole other business if we had that kinda superpower.
2. Need For Dry Ground
This is sort of related to rainy weather, but it warrants its own category because it’s a little different. Some homes might have very wet conditions around or under their home that take a long time to dry out. The ground needs to be dry enough for us to work effectively and sometimes we have to wait.
This *waiting until the ground is dry* thing happens most often with crawl space foundation homes. Some pier and beam homes take longer to dry out underneath due to poor ventilation, drainage issues, or because the home sits closer to the ground. For whatever reason, even if it’s been a week or two since the last rain, some homes take longer to really dry out underneath like we need them to.
Delays have even happened a time or two with slab foundations. Usually, there is some drainage challenge that keeps things from drying out quickly around the house. So, we have to wait longer after some soggy weather to begin our work.
2. Other Jobs Taking Longer Than Expected
There’s another tricky character that you may have met in life before: his name is *L.T. Expected*. (His full name is Sir Longer Than Expected III, Esquire, but he understandably prefers to go by L.T. for short. He doesn’t go by LTE, because then he gets confused with another guy.).
We sometimes have jobs before yours that take longer for several reasons, like:
- A foundation repair job that ends up needing tunneling due to under-slab leaks.
- Any tunnel work that needs to be extended due to more leaks being discovered.
- House leveling that encounters unforeseen wood rot or termite problems.
We want all our home repair projects to be done right. By done right, we mean with care and excellence. That means no cutting corners to finish just because we’ve got to start something else. We would rather take the time we need to complete the project with the highest standards.
You simply can’t rush quality. We’ve got to finish strong on every job for your sake and peace of mind. For Anchor, there’s no other way but the right way.
3. Waiting on Other Contractors
Well, we don’t like to blame things on other people but . . . sometimes . . .
On foundation repair projects, we often need to work with other specialized contractors. We tunnel to reach under-slab plumbing leaks, but we don’t do plumbing repairs. The plumbers need to come in and *do their thing* and we have to wait until they are done. Sometimes they can’t get out there right away, or sometimes it takes them *longer than expected* too – that’s our friend L.T. again!
L.T. likes to disguise himself as a plumber or other type of contractor on occasion. So we’re not blaming those other contractors you see, we’re blaming L.T.
4. Planning Errors
Sometimes we just goof up in our planning and it can cause delays. Planning for expected completion dates with 4 or 5 teams and juggling many other operational factors is a hard job to wrangle. Our deepest apologies. We try to be perfect, but alas we are only human. . .
5. Optimal Timing for Homeowners
Sometimes it makes more sense for you, the homeowner, to delay a job. If we see that some challenging weather is coming, we might hold off on starting a new project. We don’t want to be intrusive to your home and yard any longer than we have to.
Let’s say we have your slab foundation repair project on the books to start, and we see that two days later it’s going to rain for a whole week. It doesn’t make sense to start doing a lot of digging on your property and then leave halfway-finished holes in your yard collecting water. We would have to redo work AND there’s no reason for your property to be a work zone when no work can be carried out.
We would rather delay the start of your project and prevent your home from looking like a muddy construction site while it’s raining with no work happening anyway. We choose to delay a project like this because it will frankly be nicer for you if we wait to get started.
Here’s another example: You have a 5-day house leveling project and your start day ends up falling on a Friday. No sense in getting started and having our work involve two weeks of your life when it could just be one. We can wait until a Monday to start on your home.
We tackle smaller projects to stay busy while we wait for the optimal start time for your home if it makes for a better experience for you.
By Homeowner Request
Every so often we have to hold off starting a job because a homeowner asks us to. Between the time that you accept a proposal for work with Anchor and when your job starts, things can change. Perhaps you end up going on a trip and don’t want us to start until you get back.
You might get sick or hurt and prefer for us to wait until your condition has improved to begin.
So that *optimal timing* for homeowners can go both ways. It could be Anchor that makes the call on what would be better, but it could also be a homeowner’s decision. Of course, we are flexible to your needs when a request comes from you for a delayed start.
Job Delays Won’t Make Your Home Unsafe
Don’t worry, it’s okay to wait a few days or weeks if your Anchor Foundation Repair job gets delayed. Foundation problems take many years to form and a slight delay won’t suddenly create an unsafe condition at your home. Your Central Texas home is safe to live in while you wait on foundation repairs or other Anchor projects to begin.
How Anchor Can Get Back on Track From Job Delays
Most of our customers don’t tend to stress about a change in their Anchor project start time. But some homeowners are working under deadlines or other time constraints. You might be launching a full-fledged home renovation project that begins with foundation repair. You’ve got roofers and other contractors lined up to do other work after us and they can’t wait.
You might have a special event planned at your home and need the repairs done by a certain time so you can prepare for the big day. You might be leaving for Zimbabwe and need to see your foundation repairs completed before your 2-month trek to Africa. No matter what the reason, there could be a time that you need things done by a deadline.
No worries! We can get back on track if a timeline is critical to meet. We have options that can allow us to catch up to your original completion dates if your situation calls for it. We can:
- Work extra days of the week by adding Saturdays,
- Work longer hours on the days we are onsite, and/or
- Add extra team members or a whole other crew to the project if your job physically allows for more hands on deck.
How Long Will I Have to Wait for My Anchor Project to Start?
If we do encounter delays, it’s most often a couple of days different or up to a week on average. There are always one or two exceptions to the average, so this is a general idea for you about what we tend to see on any projects that happen to get delayed.
We can always be more specific the closer it gets to your start time. We pledge to keep in close contact with you about start dates so that you know what to expect.
Our Office and Operations team is only a phone call away should you have any questions or concerns about a delayed start time. We plan to update you often throughout the entire repair project, from start to finish on our BuilderTrend system.
Hey, have you explored BuilderTrend yet? Stay up-to-date with your Anchor Foundation Repair project, from start dates to daily logs to photos and videos showing how your project is going. Check out, “What Is BuilderTrend and How Does it Help Me With My Anchor Project?” for all the details.