What We Are
Dry Cellar waterproofs basements, repairs foundations, installs drainage and encapsulates crawl spaces across twenty towns in the New Hampshire Lakes Region — Laconia, Gilford, Meredith, Moultonborough, Wolfeboro, Alton, Gilmanton, Belmont, Tilton, Northfield, Franklin, Sanbornton, Center Harbor, Holderness, Ashland, Bristol, New Hampton, Plymouth, Tuftonboro and Barnstead.
We work on everything from nineteenth-century dry-laid fieldstone to 1970s block to modern poured concrete, and on the converted seasonal camps whose crawl spaces were never meant to sit under a heated house.
We Lead With the Cheap Answers
The diagnostic is the first thing on this site, and two of its seven outcomes end in “you can probably fix this yourself for nothing”. The water-after-rain page opens with four free checks before it mentions us at all.
That is deliberate, and it is not altruism. Roof runoff at the foundation and ground sloping toward the house cause an enormous share of the wet basements we are asked to look at, and telling people that costs us jobs we would rather not have had. It also means that when somebody's problem genuinely is a $12,000 drainage system, they believe us — because we were straight with them about the $40 version first.
The fastest way to be trusted about an expensive answer is to be honest about the cheap one.
Five Commitments
Diagnosis before quoting, every time
Where the water enters decides what the fix is, and the difference between causes is a factor of twenty in cost. Quoting a system before establishing the cause is how this trade earned its reputation.
We say so when the fix is outside and cheap
Downspouts, grading, a window well. If that is your answer, you will hear it, and we will not follow it with a drainage quote “just in case”.
We do not seal old stone foundations
They were built to breathe. Sealing them traps water in the wall and drives it into the sills above. On an antique cellar we manage water rather than blocking it, and we repoint with lime-based mortar.
We make no structural determinations
Horizontal cracking, bowing walls, anything displacing — those want a qualified structural opinion, independent of anybody quoting the repair. We will tell you that and refer you rather than reassure you.
Written assessments with photographs
So you can see what we saw, compare quotes on the same evidence, and get a second opinion if you want one.
When to Call Us
Summer is when the work should happen. The ground is dry, excavation and drainage work is easier and cheaper, and the system is in place before the next melt. A seasonal basement problem is the most predictable job in this trade, and July is the sensible time to deal with a March that you have known about since last March.
Spring is when people discover it. We expect that and we work through it — but if you are calling in March about something that also happened last March, we will probably suggest booking the real work for June and getting you through this year with a pump and a plan.
Autumn is for seasonal property. Sump checked, backup fitted, alarm working, before the house is closed for the winter. A pump that fails during a March melt in an empty building is discovered in May, and by then the problem is no longer water.
What We Do Not Do
We are not structural engineers and we do not present ourselves as any. For bowing walls, horizontal cracking or active displacement, the right next step is an independent structural opinion — from somebody who is not also quoting you the repair.
We also do not do mould remediation, radon mitigation, gutters, roofing or general landscaping. All of those come up constantly in the same conversation as a wet basement, and the moisture chain page covers who does handle them. Nobody on it pays to be there.