Musty smell, cold floors or damp dirt under the house? We cover the crawl space floor with lapped plastic that stays put.
Vapor barrier installation in Merced means laying heavy plastic sheeting over the dirt floor of your crawl space, so ground moisture and soil gases stay down there instead of getting pulled up into your house through the gaps around the floor.
Most people call because of a musty smell or cold floors, or because they looked through the access door and saw bare, damp dirt. Sometimes there's plastic down there already, but it's torn, bunched against one wall or stops short of the edges, so the ground keeps putting moisture into the space. A cover only does its job when it goes over a cleared floor and runs all the way to the walls.
The price mostly comes down to the size of the floor, how much room there is to crawl, how thick a sheet you choose and whether old plastic has to come out first. The schedule turns on water. If the yard or a drain is sending water under the house, that gets fixed before we lay anything, and your written estimate tells you what your job needs.
From the first call to the last seam, you know who's doing what and why.
I come out myself, crawl in with a flashlight and check whether there's plastic on the floor at all and what shape it's in. I take photos as I go, so you see the torn sheet or the wet dirt for yourself instead of taking my word for it.
The estimate spells out the cover we'd put down, how far it runs up the walls and any water problem that needs fixing first. If your crawl space doesn't need a new cover, I'll write that down and tell you so.
We've been doing this work since 2017, and our own crew does the install. We're licensed and insured.
Our crew starts by clearing the crawl space, pulling out old plastic, scraps and anything else on the dirt, so the new sheet lies flat on bare ground. Then we lay the sheeting across the floor, lap each seam over the next piece and carry it up the foundation walls and around every pier, where it's fastened so it stays put instead of sliding back into a pile. If we spot mold down there, I tell you before anyone disturbs it, because stirring it up can spread it into the rest of the house, and that's a real problem for anyone at home with asthma, allergies or a weak immune system.
A good floor cover handles the ground, but air leaking up through the house is a separate job. When the rooms upstairs still feel drafty, attic air sealing closes the gaps around pipes, lights and the hatch, and on older homes the crawl space work can be paired with retrofit insulation, so the whole house gets done in the right order.
Here's what the job looks like from your side of the floor.
Our crew goes in and out of the crawl space a lot, so moving storage, hoses or planters away from the opening saves everyone time. If you have pets that like to slip under the house, tell us, and we'll keep the opening shut while we're down there.
In vented crawl spaces, most moisture gets in from a yard that slopes toward the house, missing drains or sprinklers soaking the foundation, so I'll point that out on the estimate if I see it. That gets sorted first, because plastic laid over a floor that keeps getting wet just traps the water under it.
Plastic sheeting has no fumes and nothing to cure, so you don't need to leave the house. Most of what you'll hear is us moving around under the floor.
When the crew finishes, I go under and check every seam and edge before we call it done, and I'll show you photos of the finished floor. We haul out the old plastic and debris and leave your house as clean as we found it.
Tell us the rough size of the floor, whether the crawl space has vents and any signs of water or mold you've seen. We'll get back to you within one business day to set up a visit, and after I've looked under the house you get a free written estimate with no obligation.
(209) 308-1021Yes, the plastic ground cover belongs in a crawl space whether it has vents to the outside or not. Vents move air, but they leave the dirt floor bare, and that floor keeps putting moisture into the space. If your vents are open and the cover is missing or torn, that's usually the first thing I'd fix.
Federal guidance calls for plastic at least 6 mil thick, which is six thousandths of an inch, as the minimum for any crawl space cover. A California crawl space guide calls a 12-mil sheet on the floor only acceptable for inland areas like ours, and sets it against a 20-mil reinforced barrier that covers the walls in full. Thicker sheeting costs more, so I'll put the thickness on your estimate and tell you plainly whether the heavier one is worth it for how you use the space.
In California, anyone who builds or alters a structure has to be licensed by the Contractors State License Board when the project needs a building permit, uses employee labor or costs $1,000 or more in labor and materials. Any one of those is enough to require the license. We hold it, as I mentioned above.
Crawl space encapsulation across the US usually costs about $3 to $10 per square foot, and that's for full encapsulation, a broader job than a ground cover alone. It's the going rate nationally, not our price. The written estimate after I've looked under your house gives you the figure for yours.
It's easy to think a crawl space can't be wet in a place this dry, but the ground says otherwise. One California crawl space guide describes the Merced area as hot and dry with heavy clay soil that swells when it takes on water, and says that clay puts a lot of moisture into crawl spaces even when the air isn't humid. That's why the floor cover matters here, since the dirt under your house keeps giving off moisture through the driest months.
We're based in Merced and work in many cities around it, north toward Modesto and south toward Madera. Plenty of the raised-floor homes we see around here have crawl spaces nobody has looked at in years, and our crew does the same work in those cities that we do at home.
Call (209) 308-1021 or use the form, and if your old cover is still doing its job, I'll tell you so instead of selling you a new one.
If something under your house has you wondering, call (209) 308-1021 or email hello@insulationmerced.com.
Tell us about your project
