Water Damage Restoration in Marietta, GA

Marietta has had water and electric from the same city utility since 1906, and that detail tells you something about the pipes under the older streets. Marietta is the Cobb County seat, about six and a half miles southeast of our Kennesaw office in a straight line, with a 2020 population of 60,972. Marietta Square sits at the center, and a lot of the city's water damage calls come from houses that were built long before the county grew around them.

Water damage restoration services in Marietta, GA

Every service below is available to Marietta homes and businesses. Call and describe what you see, and we will tell you which one fits.

Our water damage restoration process in Marietta, GA

Four simple steps, from the first call to a dry house.

In Marietta the crew usually comes down from Kennesaw on US 41 or I-75, and we plan extra time for plaster walls in older houses.

Where your water comes from, and who to call about it

Marietta Power and Water, created by the city in 1906, supplies water to many addresses in and around the city. It buys its water wholesale from the Cobb County-Marietta Water Authority. Some addresses get both electric and water from the city, some only one of them, and some get water from another provider. Your water bill says who supplies you. If a main in the street breaks, that is the utility's problem. If the water is inside the house, it is yours, and ours.

Old house pipe leaks in Marietta and what the age of the house tells us

Marietta was settled before 1824, its first plat was laid out in 1833, and the town was legally recognized on December 19, 1834. Houses near the Square, the Kennesaw House hotel and the older streets can be many decades old, and houses of that age commonly have some mix of original and replaced plumbing. We have seen galvanized steel supply lines that corrode from the inside, cast iron drains that crack, and clay or older sewer laterals that crack or take on roots. We do not guess the material from the age of the house. We open the wall, look, and tell you what we see.

Plaster and lath walls behave differently from drywall, too. Plaster holds water longer and is harder to cut cleanly, so we pay more attention to moisture mapping before we open anything. Older crawlspaces under historic houses are often tighter and lower than newer ones, so crew time goes up.

Sewer backup cleanup in Marietta from laterals and heavy rain

Older sewer laterals, the pipe from the house to the main, are a common source of backups. Roots, cracks and old fittings let waste back up into the lowest drain, which in many houses is a basement bathroom or floor drain. Sewage is category 3 water, so we remove porous material and disinfect. A plumber clears or repairs the line first. The sewage backup cleanup page has the details.

Water extraction near Marietta Square

We use the Square as a reference point for older neighborhoods. Around it you find large older houses, some converted to offices, and commercial buildings. A burst line in an older commercial building is a different job from one in a house. See commercial water damage restoration for how we handle shops and offices. For house calls, we extract water, dry the structure and document everything for your adjuster.

Sources: Marietta, Georgia (Wikipedia).

Newer Marietta, east Cobb subdivisions and townhomes

Not all of Marietta is old. Subdivisions and townhome communities around the city, including east of the Square, have houses built in later decades. Their problems are the ones we see across Cobb County: water heater and washing machine leaks, split supply lines in crawlspaces after hard freezes, and storm water through basement doors. Marietta sits at about 1,129 feet, roughly 40 feet higher than Kennesaw's 1,089, but creeks and low lots exist in both cities.

Burst pipes and winter in Marietta

Cobb County reported hundreds of homes and businesses with water damage after the December 2022 freeze, most noticed when the pipes thawed. Older houses with exposed or poorly insulated lines were at the same risk as new ones. The burst pipe cleanup page covers what to do and in what order.

How we open an old wall with plaster, lath and old trim

Opening a wall in an older Marietta house is not the same as cutting drywall. Plaster over wood lath breaks in chunks and throws dust, and the lath can hold moisture a long time. Before we cut, we map moisture from the surface with a meter and a thermal camera, then cut the smallest opening that lets us see the cavity. Old baseboards and window casings are often solid wood that cannot be matched today, so where we can, we remove them whole, label them and set them aside instead of pulling them off in pieces.

Old houses also tend to hide older repairs: a section of copper spliced into old galvanized pipe, a drain that was rerouted, a crawlspace wall that was patched. When we find them we photograph them and tell you, because a plumber will want to know. And lead paint is a reality in houses of a certain age. If the house was built before the late 1970s, tell us, and we will plan dust control before we cut or sand anything.

Common water damage calls in Marietta

Marietta calls come from two kinds of houses. Older homes in and around the Square call about aging supply lines, water heaters and slow leaks behind plaster walls. Newer subdivisions and townhomes in east Cobb call about appliance lines, ceiling leaks from upstairs bathrooms and storm water. Sewer lateral backups after heavy rain show up in both.

The older the house, the more carefully the walls are opened, because plaster and old trim are harder to match than drywall. Tell us the age of the house when you call so we can plan for it.

How much does water damage restoration cost in Marietta, GA?

Marietta jobs range from a supply line in a newer townhome to a slow leak behind plaster in a house near the Square. Price follows the amount of wet material, the kind of water and the age and finish of the walls. The ranges below are planning numbers for Marietta homes, not quotes.

These are planning ranges from published cost guides plus our own assumptions, not quotes. Repairs such as new drywall, paint and flooring are priced separately after drying, and we do that work too. For an accurate number, call us at (678) 940-0778 for a moisture check and a written scope.

Cost guides: Angi; Fixr; HomeAdvisor.

Marietta water damage questions

Related: home, water damage restoration, ceiling water damage, mold removal, cost calculator.

Nearby: Fair Oaks, Smyrna.

Sources

Marietta, Georgia (Wikipedia); City of Marietta, Power and Water; City of Marietta, About Us; GPB, Dec. 27, 2022.