Patio Leveling in Omaha, Nebraska

A settled concrete patio is levelled by lifting it rather than replacing it, as long as the slab is still in one sound piece. Small holes are drilled through the low area, material is injected to fill the void underneath, and the pressure raises the slab back to the height and slope it should have.

The whole job is normally a single visit and the patio is back in use quickly. Furniture comes off, the crew needs room to work, and the holes are patched at the end.

Lifting is the right repair when the concrete is sound and simply sitting too low. Where the slab is broken into several pieces or the surface is crumbling, you would be paying to raise concrete that is near the end of its life, and replacement is the more honest answer.

Because the soil under it moved and the house it is attached to did not. The house sits on footings below the frost line. The patio sits on backfill, the loose soil pushed back against the foundation after construction, and backfill keeps compacting for years.

Water speeds that up. A downspout or sump discharge emptying beside the patio washes fine material out from under the slab and leaves a cavity for it to drop into. Freeze thaw cycles through an Omaha winter work water into the base again and again.

The result is the common pattern: the patio drops away from the house or tilts back toward it, while the structure stays exactly where it was.

A patio should shed water away from the house rather than toward it, and it should do that with a gentle, consistent fall. We do not publish a fixed figure, because the requirement that applies to your patio comes from local building requirements and the way the slab meets doors, thresholds and the surrounding grade. Ask your local building department if you need a number to build to.

Practically, the useful test is where the water goes. If rain runs away from the foundation and does not stand in pools on the surface, the slope is doing its job. If water runs toward the house, sits along the foundation, or ponds in low spots after a storm, the slope has changed and lifting can normally correct it without removing the slab.

Too much slope is a different complaint. A patio steep enough that furniture will not sit flat or that feels awkward underfoot has usually settled unevenly rather than been built that way, and the fix is the same: raise the low area until the fall is gentle and consistent again.

Fixing the slope and fixing the water source go together. If a downspout is still discharging beside the slab, correcting the fall treats the symptom only. Downspout extensions are simple work most owners can handle themselves.

The problems worth separating, because they need different repairs:

• Settlement, where the slab has dropped or tilted. Lifting corrects it.
• Slope toward the house, which is settlement showing up as a drainage problem. Lifting corrects it.
• Cracks caused by loss of support underneath. Lifting closes the height difference, but the crack line stays and should be sealed.
• Surface scaling, spalling and flaking from freeze thaw and salt. This is wear on the concrete itself and lifting does nothing for it.
• Open or weed filled joints, which let water into the base and cause the settlement in the first place. Cleaning and sealing them protects the repair.

The downside of concrete as a patio material is on that list: it is hard to make surface damage look new again, and a slab is only as stable as the ground under it. The upside is that when the ground is the problem, the slab itself can usually be saved.

We quote after looking at it, because the void under the slab drives the price and it is not visible from the surface. Two patios with the same visible drop can need very different amounts of material.

What the price depends on:

• Area being raised and how far it has to come up
• Volume the void actually takes
• Whether foam or cement grout suits the slab and the soil
• Access to the back of the property for equipment
• Joint and edge work needed so material does not escape

Levelling a sound patio normally costs well under what removing and repouring the same area would, which is the main reason to have it assessed before committing to replacement. We will tell you when it is not worth lifting.

Lifting is the repair that best preserves a decorative finish, because the slab you already have stays in place. We do drill small injection holes through the surface, and those patches will be visible on close inspection since new material never matches a weathered finish.

Set against a replacement pour, which will not match the original colour or pattern anywhere on the slab, most owners find that an easy trade. Hole placement is planned around the pattern where the finish allows it.

Pavers, deck tiles, gravel over a base, or a timber deck built over the slab are all common ways to get a flat usable surface without touching the concrete. They work, and on a patio with cosmetic damage and no movement they can be good value.

What they do not do is fix settlement. Covering a slab that is still dropping means the covering moves with it, and covering a slab that slopes toward the house leaves the water running at your foundation with a new surface hiding it. In that situation you are spending money to make the real problem harder to see.

The sensible order is to establish whether the slab has moved, correct it if it has, then choose a surface treatment if you still want one.