Slab foundation building in Santa Clara CA - a solid, dry base for your new house

Most people who call about a slab are building a new house or an addition and have plans in hand, or they're close to it. The price moves with the size and thickness of the slab, the steel the engineer calls for, how much digging the lot needs and how close we can get the truck. The schedule depends on the plans, the permit, the weather and the wait after the pour. When I come out, we write out what's included so you can see exactly what you're paying for.

I start by asking what's known about your lot, because the ground shapes what kind of slab makes sense, and from there we work from the engineer's plans instead of guessing. Our crew digs out and packs the subgrade, the dirt and base the slab sits on, so it doesn't settle with the soil later. We set the forms and lay the vapor barrier. Then we take extra care sealing it around each pipe that comes up through it, because a gap there lets ground moisture work up into your floors. The rebar goes in where the plans put it. That's the steel that holds the concrete together if it cracks. If the engineer calls for post-tensioning, cables that get pulled tight after the pour, those go in too. We pour early in the day, since a slab placed in midday heat can end up with a weak, dusty top. If you're looking for places to save, don't make it the base. Nobody sees it after day one, so it's the first thing people want to cut, but a nice finish on a poorly packed base is still a slab that moves.

Some houses sit on footings and walls with a crawl space under the floor, or use that along with a slab, and that's our foundation installation work. We plan it together with the slab when a house needs both. Small business owners building on a slab usually need somewhere for customers to park, and the same dig-out and base work carries into concrete parking lot building.

A new house or an addition on a slab goes through the city's Permit Center, which issues building permits and checks the plans against local and state building law. We look into the permit while I put your estimate together and check with the city office for your address. When we're the ones pulling it, we handle the paperwork and the inspections.

The ground here matters as much as the paperwork. Santa Clara sits among the valley basins, the lowest part of the valley. These soils drained down through the ground on their own, and groundwater pumping and flood control have since improved that drainage. A soil map only tells you so much, and the national soil survey says some engineering work needs someone to look at the site itself. That's why we build from the engineer's plans for your lot and not from a map. We're based in Santa Clara and work across the cities around it, and we bring the same care to slab jobs in Sunnyvale and Milpitas.