Its every homeowner’s nightmare: Water is getting into the basement. Water incursion ruins carpeting, paneling, belongings store on the floor in boxes, plus you know its damaging the very foundation of your home. And everybody’s heard horror stories about unscrupulous waterproofing contractors charging ruinous amounts of money to stop the leaks. So how do you know when you’re being taken advantage of? How can you tell who the good waterproofing contractors are? While there are no sure-fire ways to guarantee you’re getting fair treatment, there are a few steps you can take to help yourself.

1. Call you city’s Public Works or Zoning Board and ask to speak to a building inspector. Explain your situations and your concerns. Many times a city’s building inspector knows the best companies to call to get the job done. Why? Because they are the ones who have to sign-off on the work they do, ensuring that it meets city zoning requirements.

This next step takes a few minutes walking around the outside of your house.

2. See if you can find out where the water is coming in. Look for exposed concrete or blocks at the point where the sides of the house meet the ground. The site of gray concrete of “cinder blocks” means that the soil has been washed away from the foundation and water is collecting in that low spot. You can be pretty sure you’ve found the source if the exposed foundation is in the same location as the water in your basement. Often times the fix is to simply add soil to fill-in where its missing. You also need to find out why the soil washed away so look for any obvious slope of the yard towards your house. It should slope away, carrying rainwater with it!

3. Inspect your gutters. Look at the horizontal edges of your roof, where the rain would drop off. Is there a gutter there? If so, is in it good condition and mounted flush against the house? Are the gutters clean from leaves or other debris that can cause gutters to overlfow? Also check the location of the downspouts and try to understand where the water goes when it rains. Downspouts should direct the water away from the house and, ideally, down the driveway to the street.

4. One of the most common sources for basement leaks is your front porch. The large concrete slab that many houses have as the surface of their front porch can separate from the house from normal settling. Normally there is a thin barrier installed between the house and porch to prevent water from seeping down. If the porch has separated, even a little, this barrier has been compromised and water can basically pour past the porch and into your foundation. This is quickly fixed by applying some waterproof concrete sealer to the gap between the porch and house.

So now that you have a better understanding of the hydrodynamic condition of your house, its time to call a contractor to take a look. The first rule is to call several contractors and schedule appointments for the same day to keep from being forced into an agreement. Many contractors use high-pressure sales tactics to get you to sign. Knowing there are other contractors coming makes it easier for you to say “not yet; I have other contractors coming.”

The next thing is to watch what they do. If the go into the basement and start talking about chiseling up the perimeter and installing drainage tiles, kindly thank them and ask them to leave. An honest contractor would walk the perimeter of your house with you, looking for the same things discussed earlier in this article.

When you find a contractor who understands why water is leaking into your house, and if he can explain it to you in simple terms without resorting to high-pressure sales techniques (”If you sign today I can throw in the dehumidifier rental”), be sure to ask him to double check that its not something simple before signing any contract.