Dr Dry Inc

Chris' team helped reroute clogged standpipes, remediate mold, install a french drain, and replace a water damaged staircase at my parents house. Chris examined the house from top to bottom during the initial quote, and was far more thorough than anyone else we brought out. He price was very reasonable and competitive as well. The team worked hard for the three day project and helped transform a space that was noticeable damaged and moldy to a clean new state. Highly recommend.

Dr. Dry did an excellent job on our basement at a very reasonable price. Very professional and hard working. Would highly recommend to anyone.

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Initially we met with a Dr. Dry rep in July 2014 who gave us a price of around $6000 for the outside French drain and the inside sump pump installation. He collected a $1100 deposit, and told us they had 3 months to come to start the work which can be along time if you have water coming into your basement. Dr. Dry insisted  that  a couple be present for the presentation which turned out to be a huge sales pitch.. Because we had good reviews from Angies list and were desperate to fix the water leak into our basement, and could not find another company who could or would even suggest what to do , we went with Dr. Dry.

The did arrive in late September to start the job and returned daily until it was complete. They did the work outside and replaced the dirt over the French drain and the  drainage pipes so it looked good.

The big problem was the work they did  inside our finished basement. The workers had to jackhammer about 25 feet along the perimeter of the basement floor to create a trough to place a sump pump. They also cut out and removed about 1.5 feet of finished and painted wallboard above the 25 feet of floor trough. They also had to drill a hole through the foundation about 7 feet off the floor for access to a drainage pipe from the sump pump. These activities created an unbelievable mess of plaster dust, wallboard pieces, concrete dust and particles in addition to significant wall damage from their attempts to drill through the foundation. ,

Problem? Dr. Dry stated that they were not qualified to fix the cracked plaster or to replace the wall board that they had cut out so we were left with major repairs that the contract failed to mention and did not cover. The workers did cart out the majority of the concrete that they jackhammered up but we spent days with the shop-vac cleaning up the dust and pebble size pieces that they did not remove. We are still left with a crooked pipe running up the wall in our basement workout room. The workers appeared to have no respect for our property. They could have spent a few minutes sealing doors so that the mess was at least confined to part of the basement.  I was the one who pulled up the carpet, covered furniture and laid down plastic.

Dr. Dry wanted full payment even before they started the job, but luckily my husband held back a few hundred dollars (which didn't come close to covering the repairs we had to have done on the basement walls).  We met with a Dr. Dry boss and made many phone calls but we were left with the repairs to pay for ourselves.

The good thing is that we have not seen water in the basement although it has only been 6 months. We feel that  replacing the outside French drain probably did the job (since the sump pump has never come on) and that the inside work was unnecessary.

It is difficult to grade this company. We do have a dry basement, but feel that we were bullied into doing too much, paid much more than it was worth, and were left with major damage that added even more thousands to our cost. 

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If you want to bring a company into your home that is HONEST and that cares about the work that they do for their customers, then this is the company you want to call. Our basement always had some water issues. We have used other companies in the past that did not correct the issue. Frankly, we were not sure how to correct the problem and we always felt that we were being sold a product that we might or might not need OR that might or might not correct the problem. When Dr. Dry came out to our house, they suggested a course of action and explained WHY their suggested course would work. We decided to go with them, after interviewing others, and for the first time in 20 years, we have absolutely NO WATER in our basement. None! (this is not n exaggeration) When they did the basement, there was a paint issue with the resin paint adhering to the wall, but they came out and the issue was resolved. We did not need to hound them - they just think a job should be finished 'the right way'. Months later, we contracted with them to do the same for our basement garage (same issues). I highly recommend the Dr. Dry company without reservation.

He was good. I liked the rating that he had on Angie's List. They were really, really good. There was no mess at all.

The whole process was great.  They provided a detailed quote and were honest about what we needed.  The work was done in a timely manner with the guys always communicating what was going on.  Given the scale of the job, they kept things quiet and clean.  We received several quotes for this type of work and Dr Dry had by far the best prices and provided the best service.  They didn't try to upsell all this crazy stuff or make their products seem cutting edge (french drains are old tech!).  Couldn't be happier.

**Original Post 10/31/13-Indoor French Drain. Went great and will recommend them to anyone. Just check your water heater pilot before they leave each day LOL!

**Update 11/18/15-Last year I was still getting some water from an area that wasn't previously done so I had them come back out for a quote to finish the wine cellar. John showed up and said that's smaller than our minimum job of $1500.00 but if they did by back wall in the garage it would increase the footage and still be under the $1500.00 minimum. I told him it wasn't worth $1500.00 to me and asked if I were to put a drain grate across the door and tie it into their system would it void their warranty. John said he would have to get with Chris and get back to me. Still waiting for that call months later.

Initially when they installed the system they did not put the pit, pump, or discharge where John and I had agreed upon the day I signed the contract. Instead they put all of the above on the opposite corner of the room and tied the discharge into below where my kitchen sink drains. When I asked if they were even allowed to tie into the drain their response was "Oh yeah, this is the City so we can drain it into the sewer.". At the time I had no idea that that was a complete lie or that it would cause my sink to rattle and stink any time the pump kicked on. 3 things to note here are be sure you are watching when they start to dig the pit, if you live in the City of Pittsburgh make sure you know which sewage line you are on because you cannot tie into the sewer just because it is the City, and if anyone touches your plumbing they should be a certified master plumber and you should get a permit from the City. All of these things can cause issues when you go to sell your home.

September 2015-Tuesday I leave the house through the basement at 530 PM as its raining and the basement is dry, return at 7PM and the basement has water pouring over the French drain across the basement from all sides making its way to my floor drain. I walk over to the pump and it is not running so I prime it at the plug and plug it in and it runs continuously for 5 minutes or so and throughout the night as it should. I call Dr. Dry and leave a message explaining what happened. Cindy calls back and apologizes and says the earliest they can get a service call is Saturday. I explain that I have carpet and a couch that now needs thrown away and is stinking up the house but she apologizes again and says she can't get anyone out sooner. Saturday comes and Dr Dry is a no call-no show. I call and leave a message but no return call until Monday. Cindy explains the crew was broken down on the side of the road and the next time they can get out is the following Saturday. Next Saturday rolls around and the tech calls and says he is picking up a new pump and will be over but explains he will have to charge me for the pump because it is no longer under warranty. He shows up a couple hours later and I explain the pump is still under warranty because the system was installed on Halloween 2 years prior. He begins troubleshooting and I explain the cone in the pump may have just been stuck because of a long stretch of dry weather but the tech tells me this is impossible. He calls the owner, Chris, and now tells me my sewer couldn't handle the water and backed up. I explain that clearly didn't happen and showed him the pictures of the water coming out of the system and draining to the sewer. We'll just say they are really stuck on the fact that the sewer backed up and that's when I explain that when the system was installed it was agreed upon that it would drain out to the corner of the yard. At that point he does offer to run a drain pipe all the way across my basement ceiling and out into the yard so I said lets stop and just finish the wine cellar and back of the garage at a later date. He spoke with Chris and they said they would have John call me to come out and give me a price to finish. Oh, and the tech said they didn't make it the week before because they were finishing up a BIG job.

A week goes by and no call from John so I call the office and Cindy says  nobody told her to schedule anything so she sets up an appointment for Thursday. Thursday comes and John doesn't show but calls, late. I say I'd like to do the work that he said would be $1500.00 and he says they can't do it for that price now. He tells me that the price of milk and food has gone up and a wet spring has made it so that they can charge twice as much now that there is such demand. I ask so how much then? He tells me he can't say without seeing but asks me to go measure for him so I go measure. He ballparks at $3800. I explain that its less than half as much as they did for $2375 initially so he continues to tell me that they are turning away jobs this small and even walked away from a $50k job. During this conversation John also explains that the manufacturer of the pump has since reinforced the cone inside the pump because they were prone to drying up and sticking, which is what I initially thought happened but was told this was impossible by the tech.

So folks, I wouldn't recommend using this company. I'm now stuck with either voiding the warranty and having another contractor finishing the job or paying this company almost twice as much for less than half of the work they originally did. Also, if you do hire them in hopes of finishing your basement please do not feel like you have piece of mind that if you do get flooded again that you will be offered even an apology for lost items. Do yourself a favor and pay a little more for a company that stands behind their work because I regret not going with Advanced Basement Solutions now.

John did say that they would call if they got slow and possibly work on the $3800 price but I'm not holding my breathe.

Job took 5 days. They were careful to avoid our sprinkler system and repaired the lines that had to be broken in order to lay the drain. All debris were removed and they try hard not to damage the rest of the lawn.

John was proactive and responsive to my request for service.  He returned my call promptly and service was scheduled quickly. Chris and his team were fast, efficient and very professional.  They arrived in the morning and had everything finished by 3:00pm.  They located the source of the water problem and installed a new pumping system.  I feel more secure about finishing the basement now that the water problem is resolved.

They did good work from the time started and ended also cleaned up when finished.

It went well and they were very fast. Done in 3 days and they even avoided having to move the water heater so I did not have to go without hot water. They moved the major appliances and sink and then reattached everything when finished. I did have a problem with the sink trap leaking an hour after they left, so I had that replaced and had to pay a plumber for that.
The exterior blocks around the front were not patched enough and they are leaking water again but those may need complete repointing anyway which was beyond the scope of this job. Overall, the basement is great and I'm happy. I have a usable space and I'm not afraid to store things in my basement again. thank you,

I found Dr. Dry at the Home Show and made an appointment. The salesman arrived promptly for the appointment and after investigating he thoroughly explained the problems with the basement and with the exterior of the house. The entire process of what work would be done was explained. After a couple of hours and having talked to other companies, I felt confident to hire Dr Dry. I then proceeded to move stuff away from the walls and waited for the phone call for work to start. Chris and his crew arrived promptly. A french drain was installed in the interior of the house using one sump pump. They also dug up each side of the house (2 exterior sides) and installed an exterior drain that would take water to the existing drainpipe. The sump pump discharge also fed into the existing drainpipe.They then leveled my walkway on the side of the house. I was pleased with the professionalism of the crew and the work that was done, putting in long hours to finish on time. They also cleaned everything up before they left. I would not hesitate to hire them.

John came out to look at the problem and give an estimate.  Show up on time and examined the issue. He then explained in plain and simple English what the problem was and how to fix it. While other companies had come out and had laptops and high tech printers to show what the problem was and how to fix it they all had the same answer.  Decided to go with Dr Dry that day.  He said he would put us on the list and that it would be about 6 weeks until they could do the job.  Got the call the were coming out to do the job in 6 weeks. They showed up to start the job at the time they said they would be here and worked steady until the work was done. Finished  that same day. Left everything clean and in order. I will recommend them to anyone I know that has a wet basement. 100% satisfied!!!

We interviewed 8 french drain installers we met at last year's home show.  The estimates ranged from $6,000-$17,000 to eliminate the water issues we were having in our basement.  Our cellar flooded several times since December 2010, and we also had water seep through the cracks in our 100 year old concrete floor.

The salesman, John, made every effort to meet with us as many times as we needed to ask as many questions as we had.  He was very no-nonsense and honest and even met us at 10:30 on a Sunday night after we returned home from out of town.  Chris was able to schedule us in quickly, and after we moved everything off of the walls, they got started.

The work took about a week.  Each night, the cellar was left extremely clean which could not be easy as they were removing loads of concrete to install the drains.  They also removed a bathroom which was unfortunately necessary to install the drains around the entire cellar.  Some companies we met with suggested running the drains around the bathroom or stopping the drains at the bathroom wall which would not completely fix the water issue. 

On the exterior, Chris asked which plants if any we would like to keep.  In our case, we wanted all landscaping removed except for a few bulbs which they dug up and replaced when the work was completed.  They also connected our gutters.

Since the drains were installed we have had no water in the basement.  Chris returned a few weeks after the installation to spray the walls with a sealer and check the old cracks in the middle of the floor that were still wet.  He told me to give it some time to displace and we would see the dampness would disappear.  He was right, the cracks are now dry even in spots where bins are sitting on them which were always an issue.  A few weeks ago, he returned again at my request to check a few cracks in the new concrete.  After checking the areas, he reassured me that things were fine.  He also reminded me to tell the contractors finishing my basement not to nail or screw into the walls or floor. 

We appreciate the friendliness and professionalism.  At this year's home show, Chris and John even gave our two-year-old a box of cookies.  They treat you like your family and they treat your home like it's theirs.