Downhill corners cost the same to reach
Firm bearing can sit much deeper under the low corner of a hillside lot, and a deeper pier never adds to your price.
Foundation and Leaning Chimney Repair in Vinings, GA
Steep clay hills around Vinings Mountain and soft ground along the Chattahoochee let footings, terrace-level walls and tall brick chimneys drift, and Anglin's sets them back on steel push piers.
Unincorporated Cobb on the river
Foundation and chimney repair on steep Vinings clay and river bottomland
Anglin's handles foundation repair in Vinings, the unincorporated Cobb County community on the Chattahoochee across from Buckhead. Most lots here sit on eroded clay hills, some mapped on slopes of 25 to 60 percent, and the lowest streets sit on sandy river-bottom soil that floods from time to time. Those two kinds of ground move houses in different ways, and we repair both.
We drive steel push piers under what settled, stand leaning chimneys back up and finish the brick with our own crew. Call the Marietta office at 770-422-2924 for a free estimate. Your mail may say Atlanta, since the Postal Service puts Atlanta on the 30339 ZIP code that covers Vinings, but you are still in Cobb County and inside our area.
Looking up from the lower patio
The tall chimney above your terrace level
You were down on the lower patio when you looked up and saw it. The chimney on the downhill end of the house climbs past the terrace level and the main floor, and near the top the brick has eased out from the siding, a little farther each wet season. Where it passes the roof, the flashing seam has pulled open.
On a lot that falls away like yours, that chimney is the tallest piece of brick on the house, and its footing sits at the low end of the slope. Rain off the hill collects there, and the dirt pushed back against a terrace-level foundation is looser than the hill it came out of. Inside, the family room looks fine, which makes the lean easy to put off. It can come back against the wall once its footing is resting on steel.
Four generations, one Cobb County office
A Marietta mason family for steep Vinings lots
Olin L. Anglin started this business in 1930, and a fourth generation of the family works in it today from our office in Marietta.
Steel and brick, one crew
Certified welders fabricate custom brackets for heavy chimney footings and tall terrace-level walls, so nobody has to force a stock part to fit. The men who set your piers also match the brick and mortar, which matters where the brick front is what people see first.
Cracks read off commission
Some hillside cracks are only in the veneer or over a garage lintel, and whoever looks at yours earns nothing by calling them foundation problems.
Two pages, with the price written in
The contract fits on two pages, and the figure on it is what you pay when the crew packs up.
Eroded hills and river sand
What moves Vinings foundations, hilltop to river bottom
We checked 122 points inside the Vinings census boundary against the USDA soil survey.
- Eroded clay hills: About half land on Madison and Pacolet clay, most labeled eroded or severely eroded, on grades as steep as 45 percent.
- Steeper, rockier ground: About one in five falls on Louisa soils on 25 to 60 percent slopes or a bouldery soil mixed with rock outcrop.
- River bottomland: Nearly as many sit on Toccoa and Cartecay soils along the river, listed as occasionally or frequently flooded.
The clay rates low for shrinking and swelling, so houses here move because of slope, water and loose backfill instead.
Terrace-level walls and the downhill corner
A house built into a Vinings hill usually has a full block wall on the uphill side and a tall corner on the downhill side.
- Uphill block wall: It holds back the most soil and can crack level and lean inward, so we lock it with steel where it stands, never pushing it back.
- Downhill corner: It sits on the dirt pushed back after the basement was dug, so settling shows there first.
- Piers to any depth: Steel push piers go under that footing and down to load-bearing strata, however deep that turns out to be.
See how basement wall repair braces an uphill wall like that.
Low lots on soft river ground
Toccoa and Cartecay soils are sandy, and they stay wet after the river rises. A footing on ground like that can lose support unevenly as it soaks and dries, so one wall drops while the rest holds. Piers pass through the soft layer to firmer ground below it.
People who call our office describe it like this:
- "pillars on the back side of the home where there is some cracking"
- "foundation is cracked on the inside and outside"
Our foundation repair page walks through a pier job from the first hole to the final lift.
Tall stacks at the low end
Vinings hillside chimneys and two ways to straighten them
On a house that steps down a hill, a chimney at the low end can start at the terrace level and rise past two more floors, all on one footing. When water softens the ground under it, the whole stack tips away from the house and a gap opens at the wall.
What people say when they call
- "chimney that is starting to separate from his home"
- "leaning brick chimney that is pulling away from home"
A lean from the footing up
We dig out the footing and drive steel piers down to ground that can carry the weight.
- Lift and press: Piers alone would leave it out of plumb, so we lift at the base while push poles anchored about 15 feet out press the top back.
- Anchor and repoint: Brick anchors replace the broken wall ties, and our masons match the mortar in the joints the move opened, usually the same day.
A tilt in above the roof
Some chimneys lean in only above the roof, where the brick was laid on roof framing instead of a load-bearing wall. We carry that part on structural steel, beams, channel iron or angle iron depending on access, bearing on a load-bearing wall up in the attic.
We don't do caps, liners, flues or chimney leaks, and your roofer should reseal the flashing once the chimney is back in place. See leaning chimney repair for both kinds of lean.
More ways we can help
Retaining walls, decks and townhome brick in Vinings
About three in four Vinings homes are in apartment, condo or townhome buildings, so these calls come from associations as often as from owners.
Retaining and entrance walls
A wall with a hill of dirt behind it is locked where it stands, while a freestanding wall can usually come all the way back. Our retaining wall repair covers association and subdivision entrance walls, but not railroad tie walls.
Deck posts and steps
Posts at the bottom of the grade stand where water collects, so a failed footing gets a steel pier and a rotted post gets wood or steel. Front steps poured over loose fill can drop away from the door, and we lift them back level with piers rather than tearing them out.
Townhome brick veneer
About one Vinings home in nine is a townhome, and brick pulling off a wall gets pinned back with anchors under a five-year transferable warranty.
Settling condo buildings
One caller told us, "The foundations on most of these condos are starting to settle." They get the same push piers a house does.
Village crossroads to the waterline
Vinings village, mountain and river ground
Vinings has no city government, so Cobb County looks after it, and its houses came in layers. Census estimates date only about one home in 20 to before 1970, over a third to the 1970s and 1980s, and more than four in 10 to 2000 or later.
Pace House to Bakers Farm
The Pace House, built by Solomon Pace between 1865 and 1874, is kept by the Vinings Historic Preservation Society. Its chimney was rebuilt in 2009, and its foundation was raised and stabilized in 2015. The Yarbrough House, built in 1880 at Paces Ferry and Paces Mill roads, also needed chimney repair when it was restored.
Most houses here are much younger. Bakers Farm, on Woodland Brook Drive, has about 50 homes built mostly in the late 1970s and early 1980s, old enough now for footings, chimneys and decks to start showing their age.
Vinings Mountain and the 2009 flood
- The mountain above: Mount Wilkinson, which most people call Vinings Mountain, rises to 1,165 feet directly over the village.
- The river below: In the September 2009 flood, the Chattahoochee reached its highest level in 81 years at the USGS gage at Vinings.
- Water inside: One Vinings home along the river took more than six feet of water on its first floor.
Pages worth a look if your lot is steep or low
- Pace House restoration history: the preservation society's record of work on the house, including the 2015 foundation repair.
- USGS gage on the Chattahoochee at Vinings: current and past river levels right at the edge of the community.
- FEMA Flood Map Service Center: look up the flood zone mapped for your address.
- USDA Web Soil Survey: the soil map units under your own lot.
A covered deck on two pilings
When a deck and its roof sag together
One of our customers described a job like this in a Google review. His house sits on a poured concrete basement foundation, and the front deck and the roof above it rest on two pilings. Those pilings had settled about 1.5 to 2 inches, so the deck and that section of roof sagged with them.
The review doesn't say where the house is, so we don't claim it was in Vinings. It is the kind of job that fits a Vinings house built into a hill, where a deck or covered porch stands out on posts at the low side of the lot. Here is how we handle one:
- Find what dropped. We check which pilings settled and how far, and whether the sag in the roofline matches them.
- Pier the failed footings. Steel piers go under the existing footings that gave way, down to ground that can carry the load. We don't build new decks.
- Bring it back up. As the pilings are raised, the deck and the roof resting on them come up together.
- Replace what rotted. A post that has rotted can be swapped for wood or steel, depending on the structure and what you prefer.
The owner wrote that the crew showed up on time, did the job quickly and cleaned up after themselves. Deck post repairs carry a five-year warranty.
Customer Reviews
The work matters.
So does your word.
Hear from homeowners about the repair, the crew, and the finished work.
★★★★★
“We've used Anglin's Foundation & Masonry for several projects over the last 20 years. They're honest, dependable and do high quality work. These projects include correcting a structural problem with a chimney and the installation of piers to correct two other structural problems.”
Tim L.
Chimney and pier work over 20 years
Slopes, river lots and chimneys
Vinings questions on hillside footings, river ground and chimneys
Honest answers before you make a decision.
Still have QuestionsCalls answered six days a week
Your Vinings hillside corner or chimney, checked
Call 770-422-2924 Monday through Saturday, 8 AM to 6 PM, and a live answering service takes your message after hours. For jobs of $3,500 or more, Regions Bank offers financing on approved credit.
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