Long story short...I had a foundation repair done in preparation to sell home and I failed the sewage line test performed by the foundation company's plumber (reputable North Dallas plumber). Passing this test is a condition of sale and while I didn't agree tor repipe the house, I'd like to get this place sold.

Since then I've had two companies out who have done various things and can't get a good "seal" on the ball to even get an accurate test. They tried to do isolation and there's a lot of buildup in the pipes so they are having a hard time (~40 year old home). The first was pretty unprofessional and left without charging. The second one, who I thought really tried, thinks it's almost a certainty I need a repipe so I have them coming out to do an estimate tomorrow (he does the line isolation tests, a buddy is a plumber who was recommended to me by someone and he works with).

Feel a bit lost at this point since none of these guys inspire a ton of confidence with their lack of certainty. I can't shake the feeling I'm about to spend $15k to repipe when I don't even know the issue. Worse yet I'm doing all this work for the buyer and I don't feel like I agreed to come out of pocket $15k (I agreed to repair damage to plumbing from foundation repair, but no telling how long this was broken). Basically feels like if I replaced a car engine when all it needed was an oil change.

Any suggestions on course of action or plumbers in Dallas? Estimate on cost for a 1,800 square foot ranch with 2 bathrooms, laundry, and kitchen?

Try Pelayo Plumbing... we used him a few years ago for some simple fittings and was very accommodating, and some coworkers use him with great reviews as well.

F1uxCapacitor said:

---

Try Pelayo Plumbing... we used him a few years ago for some simple fittings and was very accommodating, and some coworkers use him with great reviews as well.

---

We talked. I don't remember the term he used, but he does more household plumbing like hot water heaters and fixtures. I've learned this week there are all kinds of plumbers as many don't do leak identification and some seem to only want to do $10k+ repipes.

I listen to Jim Dutton, of the Texas Home Improvement (THI) radio show, on KRLD on Sunday's and if I were in your situation, not knowing who to call for something as major as this, I wouldn't hesitate to contact them.

His website is as follows:

Texas Home Improvement

Give the following guys he highly recommends below a call and get them to assess your situation and give to an estimate. Won't cost you anything but it'll give you an option and hopefully a peace of mind as well.

Du-West Plumbing
Website / du-west.com

DALLAS / FT WORTH
Phone / 972.406.0912

On a side note, Du-West also does foundation repairs (that was their original business) so they're very knowledgeable about associated slab leak issues (both regular plumbing and sewer leak issue related to foundation failure issues) and how to properly repair them.

According to Jim, that's the main reason that Du-West eventually decided to get into the plumbing business because a majority of foundation repair jobs almost always required plumbing repairs to be performed and they (Du-West) were impacted by scheduling plumbing subcontractors to do that part of the job, which increased their costs and their schedules associated with getting the entire foundation/plumbing repair jobs done. They decided that to give the customer the best cost effective price, they needed to do the plumbing portion as well as the foundation portion and therefore minimize customer costs. Makes a lot of sense to me!