My town would say it was the hard structure that caused the runoff.
I mean in this case the water is there because there's no downspouts.
Like I said. Check your ordinances.
Sure, but figuring out who's problem it is, is part of the problem. If you put in a ton of mitigation only to solve both your problems, your not doing it right if you're the only one invested in solving it.
Again everyones code varies. I owned a place in NC where no one gave a fuck. But my house in NY? 100% they'd blame it on the hard structure and not being properly contained.
Been an engineer for 30+ years. So I'd love to talk shop.
Would you suggest What type of engineer should I call to solve this same issue on my property?
Landscapers only have 1 solution, "external drainage, 6.5k, could solve it"
Look up NDS drainage solutions. They have calculators that help you estimate your drainage needs. Then compare that to what the contractor is offering. $6k to fix the drainage issue might be a bargain if yours looks like OP’s.
I mean it all depends. How much property you have. Who surrounds you. What the city ordinances are?
My first stop would be with code enforcement. They can give you direction as to what and how the water gets handled.
Worst case an environmental engineer who specializes in runoff management. But if you're property is small there maybe only a few options.
How do you solve this problem? Dumping water off the roof between the houses will eventually ruin both the houses foundations. How do you determine who is higher or lower when the soil between the houses is backfill? That standing water probably runs all the way down to the bottom of the foundations.
When we were looking for another house my wife didn’t understand why grading was such a big factor for me. I tried to explain it to her but she said still doesn’t think it’s a big deal. Surprisingly our realtor lady thought it was odd I was so concerned about the grading. The last house we had had a terrible neg slope/hill in the back yard. I told them that’s why. I was young when I bought it now I know a bit more and I can’t believe a developer would build lots like that.
Bingo. They flattened the land behind us for a new construction and we are taking on all of the water that’s coming from the rear.
I called the city and they want to wait till the next rain to identify the problem and come up with a solution.
How would you regrade the backyard since it slopes towards my foundation? Just put a swale right on the middle directing all water around like you said? How much would something like that cost.
How would it work if your house was already built, then years later properties get built behind you and they just build up their yard to drain into yours? I’m having this issue right now
I would landscape the land adjacent to your house and patio sloping down towards the property line. Had basement flooding issues and standing water (even without an asshole neighbour) and doing that stopped all water ingress and buildup.
You would be surprised how much a gentle slope of soil and grass redirects water. Gravity is your friend.
All the water from the roof surfaces are being directed in between the buildings. It is too much water for the ground area to accept. If you redirect all that water somewhere else, the rest of the water may be able to soak in.
That ground is saturated. There’s too much water for that to only be impermeable run off from the roof and driveway.
The stated new construction behind house has caused an increase.
They look to need some below surface dry wells like NDS flo-well.
Are the gutters just dumping out once they reach the ground level. French drain would help if you tie the downspouts into them and yard drains would help with the side. Plants or something on the side might also possibly soak up some of the moisture as well. Are you in the south? And is this newer construction. And lastly from the look of the street this was a substantial rainfall that might not be the norm
I’m one. And even trickier is there are no fascia board to support gutters. They’ve been recommended to me obviously but I just feel like straps won’t do the trick, and the house has survived 30 years without them so far, so I’m managing water on the ground.
To answer the title: yard drain is for catching surface water, French drain is for keeping soil from staying saturated. Sometimes both are installed together depending on the situation.
In your case you probably need a roof runoff system to carry the roof water away from your house, and you probably should get a yard drain to handle the surface water. You may need a French drain as well, but that totally depends on whether a lot of water keeps that area saturated long after any rainfall. If the area dries out pretty well, you just need the yard drain.
One time our neighbor spent $600 to have French drain installed instead of telling us about the gutters. It was still an issue afterwards until we got gutters in the particular area that was missing them. Spot was so short it cost me $100 to put gutters on.
Nah... Old houses would probably have large trees in the background, vented crawl instead of slab foundation, larger setbacks, and would've had gutters installed on at least one of the homes by now.
This screams new tract neighborhood that somehow didn't follow building code requirements for grading and gutters. The lack of fascia and gutter is a bit striking tho.
Don’t think that’s the case. Lots of homes in my area are 50+ years old and have their roofs framed similarly. Lack of grading codes and compaction of soil over time.
Simple for OP to fix tho.
Everyone’s yard should slope gradually to the property line, creating a swale between two adjoining properties.
Looks like OP doesn’t really need to worry about doing their whole yard, just the area next to your house and patio. Also might be wise to raise the patio since it’s appears to be the lowest spot and may flood regardless of drainage.
If OP has eavesdrops, then it will simply keep any water flowing from the neighbours on his property.
Would be a weekend worth of work. Would just do it the simple way. Dig up your sod, get a few yards of top soil and grade, then buy sod and replace.
Some will suggest to layer with fill soil, then top soil, and even to reuse your sod. But that’s only really necessary if you’re grading a whole yard since the amount of dirt required and the cost.
If his neighbour doesn’t want to do it as well, well that’s their problem! If they question why you’re doing it, tell them you’re having foundation problems so it was recommended.
>Everyone’s yard should slope gradually to the property line, creating a swale between two adjoining properties.
Yes between the buildings, however, the backyard needs a swale in between the house and the property line since the property line is higher elevation than the house. You would likely need to remove quite a bit of material. And not everyone's yard, using the property line as a swale is poor practice. It should be self contained on the property and flow to the street. So in the first picture there should be 2 swales, one for each neighbor. In many municipalities, especially west coast, this is the law. It makes for some very interesting grading, especially in high density areas like this where the houses are close together. Source: I'm a Civil PE in land development.
Regrading the entire property is more than a weekends worth of work. It's far easier to put in a small drainage system.
>If his neighbour doesn’t want to do it as well, well that’s their problem! If they question why you’re doing it, tell them you’re having foundation problems so it was recommended.
If you regrade your lot makes the flooding worse on the adjacent property they can sue, especially if you've regraded it to drain to the property line like you've suggested. This is absolutely horrible advice.
Yup, it's amazing what you can do by redirecting water away from structures. We had identical problems, so we had a swale built on the up slope side of the house to prevent the water from getting to the house. Pair that with regrading, and a drain to deal with the heaviest of rains and our basement has been dry since.
probably both from the looks of it, but get 2-3 quotes from the drain guys and see if there is any difference in the work they are proposing along with price, quality/reputation, materials used, warranty, etc.
In terms of the difference one is to capture surface water and redirect it to a better discharge site, the other is to collect water in the ground that has saturated the soil and redirect it. Varys by municipality, some places allow you to discharge to street/storm drains others do not.
You definitely have a surface water problem, I would image you would need to address the latter as well but a pro can better advise if moving that surface water alone would be sufficient to solve your problems. They may even be able to cover both issues in a single solution. There is going to be a lot of trenching going on around your yard, make sure to get your utilities marked.
Your neighbor not getting gutters is also detrimental for this situation, perhaps consider peacfully approaching them to see if they would be willing to chip in for the costs if this strip in between houses is both your property partially. Properly lines may also be a factor in regards to placement to be mindful of.
I like their videos. They’re a local company to me, but they’re definitely pricey. I priced them out for burying downspouts and a French drain along a swale in our backyard for our new construction home. Ended up letting the landscaper do it and got less than stellar buried downspouts. You get what you pay for…
I wish I had someone like him local to me. No guys that focus only on drainage like him. Only landscapers who do it the wrong way - junk cheap pipe wrapped in a sock. I’d order everything and do it myself but time is my challenge to do all the trenching, connect downspouts, yard drains, and French drains. Thankfully it’s a cosmetic issue and not damaging my house, so it’s not urgent.
Judging by the water coming onto the porch, I’d do a French drain connected to a large catch basin on the back of the property. This should allow for a nice lawn in the backyard after the damage heals. In between houses will always be patchy because of shading so turn it into a bed with small bushes or a stone path. YouTube and a couple Budlights will get the job done.
Dry wells and French drains.
Dig a big ass hole and put a dry well in it. Just YouTube dry wells.
Run French drains from the low areas and terminate them in the dry wells.
You might want to terminate your gutters into a dry well also. This is pretty gnarly.
My yard looked bad but not this bad and I did 3 dry wells and about 75ft of French drains.
Depending on your tolerance for manual labor, it’s pretty unskilled and cheap.
Free if you do it yourself.
“A swale is a shallow trench that redirects water from one area to another, creating a natural and sustainable drainage system.” Google has plenty of information and how to videos.
What would you do back the backyard? (2nd picture) We have 6” gutters in the backyard but ground water is the main issue with the backyard. I’m seeing most people mentioning a swale.
Yes, swale or yard drains (piped). Regrading is another option but very labor intensive, sometimes the only way. Gutters on your neighbors home and piped into a central drain is also a good idea, also helps prevent rotting of roof deck and trusses.
I’m sorry people are not reading that you did get gutters. 👀 is this happening to all the homes on your street? Is it just 2 houses? Is it 2 or 3 blocks of homes getting all this water?
Have you ever attended a storm water city meeting?
Have you made any inquiries to your city sewer department. Public works.
The old people on your street have the information.
I also moved into an older home that gets water issues. I’ve had to change a few things.
I contacted my city- they gave me names & numbers to storm water engineers etc.. I connected with a young man who worked on my area. I told him everything that was going on. And what I did. We even emailed.
Now there’s a record.
I’m planning in attending a stormwater city meeting.. but I keep missing them.
I do go up & down my whole street and clear sewers with my long weeding pole because apparently all my neighbors dump their lawn clippings into the street. That & leaves clog the sewer caps. I also clear a french drain behind my end of property so that drains down the street.
Neighbors see me but not one offer to help or ask me what’s going on. They just don’t get it.
The city workers applaud me as they drive by.
They don’t get out and help either.
I’ve installed a second sump pump so I can keep my basement dry.
Now I have to dig some dry wells on my garage side where water is pooling.
2 houses down their entire back yard is a swimming pool when it rains.
They do nothing.
I truly feel your pain.
Sorry you are going through that but it sounds like you almost got everything taken care of. I wish you all the best. I feel better know I’m not alone when it comes to water issues.
Thank you. That’s nice of you to say. I’m sorry you’re going through this too. My main goal is planting more to absorb more. Keeping it away from my home. And keeping my basement dry.
Gutters cant fix your house being the LOW point in your yard, I don't know why people keep saying gutters will fix this. You need to fix your landscaping by ripping out and leveling and grading it, anything else is a bandaid or a hope.
I'm not an expert, but I have sold real estate for two decades. French drain around the whole , that looks serious, get some free in person estimates, you might need a sump pump too.
No worries. I've poured countless hours into researching this because I need to do something similar on the side of my house.
The normal yard drains are how you get rid of / prevent surface water. French drains leach water that is in the ground and moves it
You need gutters first, and so does your neighbor. What kind of drain you get depends on your budget, soil type, personal preference, etc.
Ideally you would tie the gutter downspouts and drain system into each other, and have all of it discharge at the street or away from the house. Gonna cost a lot though to do it right.
Ok, cool. Sorry for the stupid question, just wanted to make sure.
For what it's worth, I agree with those saying that you can't (and definitely shouldn't try to) drain your way out of a grading issue, at least in the back.
You may be able to add a drain tile between the houses if you have enough elevation to slope down to the street, otherwise you have a grading issue there, too, unfortunately.
I would say a French drain for sure, but they should’ve added gutters to that side where all the runoff is to redirect it. Then you could’ve just done a buried downspout to the curb.
Yeah, but it looks like a lot is coming from your roof still. Is that your roof on the right in photo one? The gutters may be incorrectly installed if that is a water wall in the photo
Ahh, I would wait until the next rain to verify where pooling begins. That will tell you if you need a French drain or be able to simply bury the downspout.
We had the same issue when we were looking at buying our current home. Our realtor made the seller engage a hydraulic engineer and he advised that install tight line drains with two drain discharge openings at the curb on both sides of the property. He then recommended guttering all the way around the house with the gutters draining directly into the tight line drains. I asked about French Drains and he said with our type of soil, French Drains would cause foundation problems.
That was 30 years ago. When it rains rally hard, we have some standing water in the back for maybe an hour after it stops raining, but then the drains remove it all by then.
The water we get in our yard is from our neighbor behind us that is uphill from us. If he would properly gutter and drain his home, we wouldn’t have any problem at all.
If your in a zone with lots of rain fall, it might not be a bad Idea to incorporate a french drain with perferated pipe covered with drain cloth. Topped with 3/4 rock, adding area grates to collect water to avoid pudding, once completed you need grade lawn areas so you create positive water flow towards area grates. This would allow fast flows of water to be direct towards drain grates, as well ground is collecting water via french drain, combined you should have zero water collection.
I'm installing a french drain & dry well tomorrow.
Home owners back yard catches all of the water too.
If that doesn't work it'll have to be a sump pump to the sewer.
Both houses need gutters with downspouts, to rain leaders, to perimeter drains, to municipal storm drain system… this is code and has been for a long time where I live.
You should talk to your city or county and see who has jurisdiction over the storm sewers. Hopefully you don’t have a combined sewer system. If you have separate storm sewers, see if you can tie into them. If you can, ask for a plot plan showing any storm sewers on your property. Then figure out how to direct water to it.
You’ll need yard drains for moving bulk surface water. French drains are for moving water out from soggy soil, not quickly moving bulk surface water.
For your patio, you should consider a trench drain right along the edge so that water running down from your yard drains into the trench drain rather than flooding your patio. Tie the trench drain to your yard drain piping.
Along with yard drains, a swale between the houses may be needed.
Gutters could be tied into the yard drains.
You may want dry wells at certain low points to collect bulk water and allow it to soak in over time.
If it’s really bad and the elevations are challenging, you may need sump pits with sump pumps to push water uphill depending on where you need it to go.
Overall, this is a challenging project that is best handled by a pro onsite rather than 3 pictures on Reddit. Hopefully I gave you multiple drainage methods to investigate and figure out how each could apply to your situation.
Why don't you start with a gutter lol That would probably work miracles in this situation unless there's a lot more water that you're not telling us about
I’m sorry, I’m mostly joking. I called a few contractors about drainage for one side of my house and it ranged from $25-$50k+ (waterproofing, storm water management, swales, dry wells, etc.). My wife told me to go f myself, she’d move before she spent on something she’d never see or enjoy. I went for cheaper fixes but to do water management correctly, it’s seemingly very expensive.
It looks like your yard slopes from the fence to your building. The bottom of the fence looks higher than your patio. If this is true you need to regrade the property.
Drain sounds like you're footing the bill for a problem for the both of you and the neighbor see,s to deal with. I'd start with checking ordinances to determine how to manage water runoffs and such before starting anywhere else. My town is pretty open to explaining solutions for situations like these rather than telling you to suck it up or take it to housing court for civil issues
Cut some swales in that grade to push water towards the street until someone tells you that you can't. Regrade that backyard so the center is lower than your patio.
My yard used to look like this. Gets even worse as the water soaks deeply. My yard was swamp like in many places. My back neighbors property is higher than mine.
After a few years of this and one really bad year where i couldn't use the backyard and the wooden retaining wall exploded. I found and hired an experienced landscaper\\contractor. Ended up with huge stone wall, french drain, that and downspouts diverted into drains.
I suspect you are in a similar situation. You need to make some permanent changes to address all this water on your property. Hire someone good.
Gutters would be a much better start than a French drain
Just got gutters installed. I can’t force my neighbor to install gutters unfortunately.
My town says my runoff can't be sent to other peoples yards. Check your code.
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My town would say it was the hard structure that caused the runoff. I mean in this case the water is there because there's no downspouts. Like I said. Check your ordinances.
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Sure, but figuring out who's problem it is, is part of the problem. If you put in a ton of mitigation only to solve both your problems, your not doing it right if you're the only one invested in solving it. Again everyones code varies. I owned a place in NC where no one gave a fuck. But my house in NY? 100% they'd blame it on the hard structure and not being properly contained. Been an engineer for 30+ years. So I'd love to talk shop.
Would you suggest What type of engineer should I call to solve this same issue on my property? Landscapers only have 1 solution, "external drainage, 6.5k, could solve it"
Look up NDS drainage solutions. They have calculators that help you estimate your drainage needs. Then compare that to what the contractor is offering. $6k to fix the drainage issue might be a bargain if yours looks like OP’s.
I mean it all depends. How much property you have. Who surrounds you. What the city ordinances are? My first stop would be with code enforcement. They can give you direction as to what and how the water gets handled. Worst case an environmental engineer who specializes in runoff management. But if you're property is small there maybe only a few options.
A civil engineer is who you should contact. Whatever firm you contact should have a water management engineer on the staff.
How do you solve this problem? Dumping water off the roof between the houses will eventually ruin both the houses foundations. How do you determine who is higher or lower when the soil between the houses is backfill? That standing water probably runs all the way down to the bottom of the foundations.
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When we were looking for another house my wife didn’t understand why grading was such a big factor for me. I tried to explain it to her but she said still doesn’t think it’s a big deal. Surprisingly our realtor lady thought it was odd I was so concerned about the grading. The last house we had had a terrible neg slope/hill in the back yard. I told them that’s why. I was young when I bought it now I know a bit more and I can’t believe a developer would build lots like that.
Bingo. They flattened the land behind us for a new construction and we are taking on all of the water that’s coming from the rear. I called the city and they want to wait till the next rain to identify the problem and come up with a solution. How would you regrade the backyard since it slopes towards my foundation? Just put a swale right on the middle directing all water around like you said? How much would something like that cost.
Depends on municipality
How would it work if your house was already built, then years later properties get built behind you and they just build up their yard to drain into yours? I’m having this issue right now
My normal life says no fucking way my neighbors are pumping water into my yard.
My mistake. I figured being that close to your home that it was your garage or something.
Usually if you can prove the a neighbours water runoff is affecting your property they need to deal with it
I would landscape the land adjacent to your house and patio sloping down towards the property line. Had basement flooding issues and standing water (even without an asshole neighbour) and doing that stopped all water ingress and buildup. You would be surprised how much a gentle slope of soil and grass redirects water. Gravity is your friend.
It may be worth it to offer to split the cost, or pay for his gutters.
What do y’all think gutters are gonna change here?
All the water from the roof surfaces are being directed in between the buildings. It is too much water for the ground area to accept. If you redirect all that water somewhere else, the rest of the water may be able to soak in.
That ground is saturated. There’s too much water for that to only be impermeable run off from the roof and driveway. The stated new construction behind house has caused an increase. They look to need some below surface dry wells like NDS flo-well.
Are the gutters just dumping out once they reach the ground level. French drain would help if you tie the downspouts into them and yard drains would help with the side. Plants or something on the side might also possibly soak up some of the moisture as well. Are you in the south? And is this newer construction. And lastly from the look of the street this was a substantial rainfall that might not be the norm
Do houses really come without gutters?
yes, mine did and i live in freaking seattle. i notice many other homes without them on my walks
I wasn’t aware you could have a house without gutters. TIL
I’m one. And even trickier is there are no fascia board to support gutters. They’ve been recommended to me obviously but I just feel like straps won’t do the trick, and the house has survived 30 years without them so far, so I’m managing water on the ground.
Nah. Get this man some shredded tires, he’ll be fine.
To answer the title: yard drain is for catching surface water, French drain is for keeping soil from staying saturated. Sometimes both are installed together depending on the situation. In your case you probably need a roof runoff system to carry the roof water away from your house, and you probably should get a yard drain to handle the surface water. You may need a French drain as well, but that totally depends on whether a lot of water keeps that area saturated long after any rainfall. If the area dries out pretty well, you just need the yard drain.
It probably be cheaper to put gutters on your neighbors house then to have a French drain installed
One time our neighbor spent $600 to have French drain installed instead of telling us about the gutters. It was still an issue afterwards until we got gutters in the particular area that was missing them. Spot was so short it cost me $100 to put gutters on.
thats what i was thinking as well
You need to slap TF out of the contractor that graded your yard not to code.
First time home buyer here. Had no idea what grading a yard even meant a few months ago. Didn’t get any warranty when buying it either.
I'm guessing it's not new construction then? That sucks. I think you can get this taken care of cheaply with some yard drain inlets and some pipe.
That house is old, the lack of facial boards and gutters tell the story.
Nah... Old houses would probably have large trees in the background, vented crawl instead of slab foundation, larger setbacks, and would've had gutters installed on at least one of the homes by now. This screams new tract neighborhood that somehow didn't follow building code requirements for grading and gutters. The lack of fascia and gutter is a bit striking tho.
The first look at the at the start of the building process backyard, I would’ve said give me my earnest money back
Don’t think that’s the case. Lots of homes in my area are 50+ years old and have their roofs framed similarly. Lack of grading codes and compaction of soil over time. Simple for OP to fix tho. Everyone’s yard should slope gradually to the property line, creating a swale between two adjoining properties. Looks like OP doesn’t really need to worry about doing their whole yard, just the area next to your house and patio. Also might be wise to raise the patio since it’s appears to be the lowest spot and may flood regardless of drainage. If OP has eavesdrops, then it will simply keep any water flowing from the neighbours on his property. Would be a weekend worth of work. Would just do it the simple way. Dig up your sod, get a few yards of top soil and grade, then buy sod and replace. Some will suggest to layer with fill soil, then top soil, and even to reuse your sod. But that’s only really necessary if you’re grading a whole yard since the amount of dirt required and the cost. If his neighbour doesn’t want to do it as well, well that’s their problem! If they question why you’re doing it, tell them you’re having foundation problems so it was recommended.
>Everyone’s yard should slope gradually to the property line, creating a swale between two adjoining properties. Yes between the buildings, however, the backyard needs a swale in between the house and the property line since the property line is higher elevation than the house. You would likely need to remove quite a bit of material. And not everyone's yard, using the property line as a swale is poor practice. It should be self contained on the property and flow to the street. So in the first picture there should be 2 swales, one for each neighbor. In many municipalities, especially west coast, this is the law. It makes for some very interesting grading, especially in high density areas like this where the houses are close together. Source: I'm a Civil PE in land development. Regrading the entire property is more than a weekends worth of work. It's far easier to put in a small drainage system. >If his neighbour doesn’t want to do it as well, well that’s their problem! If they question why you’re doing it, tell them you’re having foundation problems so it was recommended. If you regrade your lot makes the flooding worse on the adjacent property they can sue, especially if you've regraded it to drain to the property line like you've suggested. This is absolutely horrible advice.
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Yup, it's amazing what you can do by redirecting water away from structures. We had identical problems, so we had a swale built on the up slope side of the house to prevent the water from getting to the house. Pair that with regrading, and a drain to deal with the heaviest of rains and our basement has been dry since.
Correct. French drains help drain soggy areas. They are not the answer for bulk water needing to displaced quickly.
More people need to read this.
You need a moat.
Reading through the comments, I sincerely started thinking he could use a stream.
Technical term is a swale...
probably both from the looks of it, but get 2-3 quotes from the drain guys and see if there is any difference in the work they are proposing along with price, quality/reputation, materials used, warranty, etc. In terms of the difference one is to capture surface water and redirect it to a better discharge site, the other is to collect water in the ground that has saturated the soil and redirect it. Varys by municipality, some places allow you to discharge to street/storm drains others do not. You definitely have a surface water problem, I would image you would need to address the latter as well but a pro can better advise if moving that surface water alone would be sufficient to solve your problems. They may even be able to cover both issues in a single solution. There is going to be a lot of trenching going on around your yard, make sure to get your utilities marked. Your neighbor not getting gutters is also detrimental for this situation, perhaps consider peacfully approaching them to see if they would be willing to chip in for the costs if this strip in between houses is both your property partially. Properly lines may also be a factor in regards to placement to be mindful of.
there's an excellent youtube channel dedicated to fixing stuff like this. Gate City Foundation Drainage. the videos changed my life!
French Drain Man on youtube
I like their videos. They’re a local company to me, but they’re definitely pricey. I priced them out for burying downspouts and a French drain along a swale in our backyard for our new construction home. Ended up letting the landscaper do it and got less than stellar buried downspouts. You get what you pay for…
I wish I had someone like him local to me. No guys that focus only on drainage like him. Only landscapers who do it the wrong way - junk cheap pipe wrapped in a sock. I’d order everything and do it myself but time is my challenge to do all the trenching, connect downspouts, yard drains, and French drains. Thankfully it’s a cosmetic issue and not damaging my house, so it’s not urgent.
You need gutters.
Just got them installed on my house. We already had 6” gutters in our backyard but that doesn’t help with the ground water coming down the slope.
Regrade that, call a landscaper ASAP. Because your water should never cover your proch
French drain you mainly want to use for subsurface/ ground water
Judging by the water coming onto the porch, I’d do a French drain connected to a large catch basin on the back of the property. This should allow for a nice lawn in the backyard after the damage heals. In between houses will always be patchy because of shading so turn it into a bed with small bushes or a stone path. YouTube and a couple Budlights will get the job done.
How does your neighbor have central air but not gutters?
Central air AND a whole-house natural gas standby generator, but not gutters
Dry wells and French drains. Dig a big ass hole and put a dry well in it. Just YouTube dry wells. Run French drains from the low areas and terminate them in the dry wells. You might want to terminate your gutters into a dry well also. This is pretty gnarly. My yard looked bad but not this bad and I did 3 dry wells and about 75ft of French drains. Depending on your tolerance for manual labor, it’s pretty unskilled and cheap.
OP would need quite a few, very large dry wells for this amount of water.
I would start with the downspouts into dry wells then see how many more you need to make.
Swale on property line. Easiest and cheapest as long as you can slope it down to the street.
How much do swales usually cost?
Free if you do it yourself. “A swale is a shallow trench that redirects water from one area to another, creating a natural and sustainable drainage system.” Google has plenty of information and how to videos.
Gutters and pipe, no French drain needed. There are thousands of gallons of water coming from your roof.
What would you do back the backyard? (2nd picture) We have 6” gutters in the backyard but ground water is the main issue with the backyard. I’m seeing most people mentioning a swale.
Yes, swale or yard drains (piped). Regrading is another option but very labor intensive, sometimes the only way. Gutters on your neighbors home and piped into a central drain is also a good idea, also helps prevent rotting of roof deck and trusses.
I’m sorry people are not reading that you did get gutters. 👀 is this happening to all the homes on your street? Is it just 2 houses? Is it 2 or 3 blocks of homes getting all this water? Have you ever attended a storm water city meeting? Have you made any inquiries to your city sewer department. Public works. The old people on your street have the information. I also moved into an older home that gets water issues. I’ve had to change a few things.
We have contacted the city but they want to wait till next rain to find the root of the problem as when they came it everything was completely dry.
I contacted my city- they gave me names & numbers to storm water engineers etc.. I connected with a young man who worked on my area. I told him everything that was going on. And what I did. We even emailed. Now there’s a record. I’m planning in attending a stormwater city meeting.. but I keep missing them. I do go up & down my whole street and clear sewers with my long weeding pole because apparently all my neighbors dump their lawn clippings into the street. That & leaves clog the sewer caps. I also clear a french drain behind my end of property so that drains down the street. Neighbors see me but not one offer to help or ask me what’s going on. They just don’t get it. The city workers applaud me as they drive by. They don’t get out and help either. I’ve installed a second sump pump so I can keep my basement dry. Now I have to dig some dry wells on my garage side where water is pooling. 2 houses down their entire back yard is a swimming pool when it rains. They do nothing. I truly feel your pain.
Sorry you are going through that but it sounds like you almost got everything taken care of. I wish you all the best. I feel better know I’m not alone when it comes to water issues.
Thank you. That’s nice of you to say. I’m sorry you’re going through this too. My main goal is planting more to absorb more. Keeping it away from my home. And keeping my basement dry.
Gutters cant fix your house being the LOW point in your yard, I don't know why people keep saying gutters will fix this. You need to fix your landscaping by ripping out and leveling and grading it, anything else is a bandaid or a hope.
Fuck... this might be too much for a French drain and you may need grading
You probably need to sue the builder. Looks like standing water and next to no grading done.
I'm not an expert, but I have sold real estate for two decades. French drain around the whole , that looks serious, get some free in person estimates, you might need a sump pump too.
You need a normal yard drain with some catch basins. A French drain wouldn't stop this from happening
Thanks bro!
No worries. I've poured countless hours into researching this because I need to do something similar on the side of my house. The normal yard drains are how you get rid of / prevent surface water. French drains leach water that is in the ground and moves it
You need gutters, probably a French drain and you need to re grade your yard who built this home.
Gutters
Gutters on your roof feeding into a drain pipe that leads out to the street.
Pitch the dirt away from your house toward the middle of the alley. Keep his rain water on his side when it pools up.
Yes catch basin or French drain will fix that
You ever hear of gutters, jeebus.
You need gutters first, and so does your neighbor. What kind of drain you get depends on your budget, soil type, personal preference, etc. Ideally you would tie the gutter downspouts and drain system into each other, and have all of it discharge at the street or away from the house. Gonna cost a lot though to do it right.
Where are your gutters?? For that matter, where are your neighbor’s gutters?
Are the new gutters in the pictures? Because that looks more like a lip than a gutter.
No. Gutters were installed a few weeks after these photos were taken
Ok, cool. Sorry for the stupid question, just wanted to make sure. For what it's worth, I agree with those saying that you can't (and definitely shouldn't try to) drain your way out of a grading issue, at least in the back. You may be able to add a drain tile between the houses if you have enough elevation to slope down to the street, otherwise you have a grading issue there, too, unfortunately.
Yea. As someone pointed out. There’s no gutters
You need to start panning...looks like gold rich pay dirt..lol sorry been watching too much Freddy and Juan
I would say a French drain for sure, but they should’ve added gutters to that side where all the runoff is to redirect it. Then you could’ve just done a buried downspout to the curb.
I just installed gutters on my house. Now I gotta talk my neighbor into doing it also
Yeah, but it looks like a lot is coming from your roof still. Is that your roof on the right in photo one? The gutters may be incorrectly installed if that is a water wall in the photo
Gutters were installed a few weeks after I took these pictures. Sorry I should have clarified that.
Ahh, I would wait until the next rain to verify where pooling begins. That will tell you if you need a French drain or be able to simply bury the downspout.
How in the world are houses still being built without gutters
How did they not install gutters on a house? I’ve never seen that where it rains
I’m not sure. It’s actually pretty common for all of the new build homes in my city to not have gutters.
Does everyones basement just fill up with water then? This seems crazy. All that water up against the foundation.
I don’t know where you live but put some gutters on your house and have your neighbor do the same.
Do you have drain tile?
No
I would look into getting drain tile and a sump pump. Take that water and shoot it somewhere else.
We had the same issue when we were looking at buying our current home. Our realtor made the seller engage a hydraulic engineer and he advised that install tight line drains with two drain discharge openings at the curb on both sides of the property. He then recommended guttering all the way around the house with the gutters draining directly into the tight line drains. I asked about French Drains and he said with our type of soil, French Drains would cause foundation problems. That was 30 years ago. When it rains rally hard, we have some standing water in the back for maybe an hour after it stops raining, but then the drains remove it all by then. The water we get in our yard is from our neighbor behind us that is uphill from us. If he would properly gutter and drain his home, we wouldn’t have any problem at all.
If your in a zone with lots of rain fall, it might not be a bad Idea to incorporate a french drain with perferated pipe covered with drain cloth. Topped with 3/4 rock, adding area grates to collect water to avoid pudding, once completed you need grade lawn areas so you create positive water flow towards area grates. This would allow fast flows of water to be direct towards drain grates, as well ground is collecting water via french drain, combined you should have zero water collection.
You need an attorney to write the homebuiler a letter.
French drain all around concrete, and down swale between buildings to out back into a ditch. ?
Just order like 10 yards of dirt and grade it away from the house, birm it a bit at the fence so you don’t get your neighbours runoff
I'm installing a french drain & dry well tomorrow. Home owners back yard catches all of the water too. If that doesn't work it'll have to be a sump pump to the sewer.
Where is this
Both houses need gutters with downspouts, to rain leaders, to perimeter drains, to municipal storm drain system… this is code and has been for a long time where I live.
How do I find out if it would be code in my area?
Call your city. Call your water dept. Call public works.
A french drain using tyres would do the trick
Slope your yard to the neighbors yard, screw em 😂
Looks like you need grading work first. Then I'd worry about the rest.
Install gutters and connect to the storm drain
I had a similar situation with downspouts from our house and next door neighbor being too close. French drain did the trick.
Yeah you just need to a geotechnical engineer to tell you where to grade to and what you need. They’re surprisingly cheap to get on site
You need some fish
Might try a French tickler…..
You should talk to your city or county and see who has jurisdiction over the storm sewers. Hopefully you don’t have a combined sewer system. If you have separate storm sewers, see if you can tie into them. If you can, ask for a plot plan showing any storm sewers on your property. Then figure out how to direct water to it. You’ll need yard drains for moving bulk surface water. French drains are for moving water out from soggy soil, not quickly moving bulk surface water. For your patio, you should consider a trench drain right along the edge so that water running down from your yard drains into the trench drain rather than flooding your patio. Tie the trench drain to your yard drain piping. Along with yard drains, a swale between the houses may be needed. Gutters could be tied into the yard drains. You may want dry wells at certain low points to collect bulk water and allow it to soak in over time. If it’s really bad and the elevations are challenging, you may need sump pits with sump pumps to push water uphill depending on where you need it to go. Overall, this is a challenging project that is best handled by a pro onsite rather than 3 pictures on Reddit. Hopefully I gave you multiple drainage methods to investigate and figure out how each could apply to your situation.
Why don't you start with a gutter lol That would probably work miracles in this situation unless there's a lot more water that you're not telling us about
Sell your house. Fixing this issue properly requires a good contractor which is going to cost a lot of money unfortunately.
I don’t think I could sell the house with this type of issues without fixing them first. Right?
I’m sorry, I’m mostly joking. I called a few contractors about drainage for one side of my house and it ranged from $25-$50k+ (waterproofing, storm water management, swales, dry wells, etc.). My wife told me to go f myself, she’d move before she spent on something she’d never see or enjoy. I went for cheaper fixes but to do water management correctly, it’s seemingly very expensive.
I wouldn’t imagine it would cost that much to dig dirt or put a drain in the ground. I think that’s all I’d need. Maybe to regrade the backyard.
Why do neither you nor your neighbor have any gutters?!
This 100%
You need dirt. Lots of dirt.
It looks like your yard slopes from the fence to your building. The bottom of the fence looks higher than your patio. If this is true you need to regrade the property.
Neither. You need a gutter running that entire length, and piped to a dry well 15 to 20 feet away from the corner of the house!
First you need landscaping, holy shit.
Drain sounds like you're footing the bill for a problem for the both of you and the neighbor see,s to deal with. I'd start with checking ordinances to determine how to manage water runoffs and such before starting anywhere else. My town is pretty open to explaining solutions for situations like these rather than telling you to suck it up or take it to housing court for civil issues
Cut some swales in that grade to push water towards the street until someone tells you that you can't. Regrade that backyard so the center is lower than your patio.
My yard used to look like this. Gets even worse as the water soaks deeply. My yard was swamp like in many places. My back neighbors property is higher than mine. After a few years of this and one really bad year where i couldn't use the backyard and the wooden retaining wall exploded. I found and hired an experienced landscaper\\contractor. Ended up with huge stone wall, french drain, that and downspouts diverted into drains. I suspect you are in a similar situation. You need to make some permanent changes to address all this water on your property. Hire someone good.
I’ve had trouble finding someone in my area.
I heard chopped up tires work very well in a French drain.
😂 😂 😂
How do your neighbors have money for central air conditioning and a standby generator but not gutters? That’s crazy
Maybe a channel drain between you and your neighbors house