Somerset Foundation Services — No Guesswork

What Foundation and Waterproofing Challenges Affect Somerset?

Somerset is a newer, master-planned community of modern multi-story homes and landscaped green space — and even here, on some of the most recently built foundations in Des Moines, the ground has a say. Fresh construction sits on freshly graded lots, and freshly placed soil is still settling.

As that graded fill compacts under the weight of a two-story house, foundations experience early-stage settlement, showing up as fine cracks or a door that's fallen out of square in the first years. The bigger, avoidable risk is water: if grading and gutters aren't managing runoff, rain pools against the deep poured walls, saturating the clay-rich soil and adding pressure the foundation didn't need while it's still finding its level.

JLB keeps a new foundation on track. Where early settlement has begun, we pier the affected footings to compacted, stable strata beneath the fill so movement stops before it compounds. And we correct grading and extend downspouts to carry water clear of the walls — keeping the surrounding clay from swelling against a foundation that's still consolidating.

A modern Somerset home benefits from getting the ground and the drainage right early. We stabilize initial settlement and manage the runoff around it — so a new foundation settles onto stable soil instead of into a problem.

In a new Somerset home the early cracks are usually the fill still settling — routine to a point, a problem if the grading lets water accelerate it. We check whether the movement is normal consolidation or something the drainage is worsening, so a modern foundation gets stabilized correctly instead of patched while the ground is still finding its level.