Before you sign
What a foundation warranty is actually worth
Only as much as the company behind it and the words in it. Federal warranty law very likely does not reach this work.
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Written by HyreFoundation Research Desk Primary-source research and fact checking
The short answer
A lifetime foundation repair warranty is worth only what the issuing company is worth, for as long as it exists.
The federal Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act very likely does not apply to work built into a house, so the contract’s own terms are your whole protection.
Check who issues it, what “lifetime” means, what it covers, what voids it, and whether it transfers.
Key takeaways
Things integrated into a dwelling are not "consumer products", and warranties on a repairer’s workmanship are not subject to the Act.
A transferable warranty cannot mean two of them.
Absent a named third party, it is a promise by one company.
It tells the contractor how to write the agreement and says nothing about what the warranty must contain.
How to check the company behind the promise
All of this is public, free, and takes about twenty minutes — and it matters more than the wording, because the wording is only as good as the entity.
Search your Secretary of State for its registration date, status, officers, and whether it trades under a different name. The name on the truck and the name on the contract are not always the same, and it is the second one that owes you.
A long-established brand operating through a recently formed company is worth understanding, as is a business that dissolved and re-registered.
Get the answer in writing. Roll-ups are common in this industry.
That means a named, state-admitted insurer or an administrator. Verify that name through your state insurance department’s licensee lookup rather than accepting a logo.
A state license bond is a capped, shared, credit-based surety for consumers harmed by defective work or license violations; the surety seeks repayment from the contractor. It is not warranty insurance.
At least one state runs a home improvement guaranty fund reaching a licensed contractor’s acts, but with per-claimant and per-contractor caps far below a whole-house foundation re-do, and an arbitration agreement may have to be honored first.
Not from a PDF the contractor emails you.
A warranty is a long-term product; recent references tell you about the sales process.
What the law does and does not do here
Each point is drawn from a primary source in the list at the foot of this page.
Under 16 CFR §700.1, the Magnuson-Moss Act does not reach "items which are integral component parts of the structure" or products "integrated into the structure of a dwelling". And "warranties which apply solely to a repairer’s workmanship in performing repairs are not subject to the Act".
We found no federal or general state rule that a foundation-repair workmanship warranty be insured, bonded, reinsured or reserved against. Without a document naming a third-party obligor, it binds the issuing company alone, for as long as that company exists and is solvent.
Home improvement statutes in the states we checked govern the agreement: written and signed before work, license details, price, payment schedule, dates, lien and cancellation notices. None says what the warranty must contain or whether it must be backed. California caps the deposit at $1,000 or 10 percent, whichever is less.
In Gonzales v. Southwest Olshan Foundation Repair Co. (Supreme Court of Texas, 2013), the court held the implied warranty of good and workmanlike repair cannot be disclaimed but can be superseded by an agreement specifically describing the manner, performance or quality of the services.
In that case, the company’s promise to adjust the foundation for the life of the home superseded the implied warranty. The jury found no breach of the express one, and the consumer-statute claim was time-barred. That is Texas law; do not assume it applies in your state.
Under the model business corporation act as enacted by states, a dissolved company can bar claims by publication notice, including contingent claims arising later, unless proceedings begin within a limited window.
An unbarred claim reaches only undistributed assets, or shareholders up to what they received. A lifetime warranty claim years later is exactly that kind of claim.
Whether a buyer assumes outstanding warranties turns on the purchase agreement and state successor-liability doctrine, which you cannot see from outside. A rebranded company trading under the same name is not proof of assumption. Ask for it in writing.
The clauses that actually decide whether it pays
Ask for the warranty document before you sign the contract, not with the paperwork afterward. A company that will not show it in advance has told you something. The federal rule on what a warranty should disclose may not legally bind a foundation contractor — it remains the right checklist for judging one.
| Option | What it means for you |
|---|---|
| What "lifetime" refers to | The FTC notes at least three uses: the life of the thing it is installed in, the life of the original purchaser’s ownership, or the life of the purchaser. A transferable warranty cannot mean either of the last two. Get the start point and the measure of duration in writing. |
| Who the named obligor is | If the only name on the document is the contractor’s, there is no third party standing behind it. This is the single most informative line in the whole document. |
| What is covered | Usually the installed piers and their performance, sometimes only against further settlement at those specific locations. Generally not the rest of the foundation, not movement at an untreated area, and frequently not heave. |
| Parts or workmanship | Legally different objects. A warranty on hardware and a warranty on the labor of installing it are not the same promise, and re-excavation is usually the expensive part. |
| What the remedy is | Typically adjusting or re-driving piers. Frequently not excavation, interior access, floor coverings, landscaping, hardscape or cosmetic repair — which can exceed the pier work itself. |
| Transferability | To how many successive owners, within what window, for what fee, and whether it needs the company’s written consent. Notification windows are easy to miss during a sale. |
| What voids it | Maintenance conditions are routine: maintaining drainage and grading, watering programs in expansive clay, not altering landscaping, no later work by others. Breaching one can void cover quietly. |
| Dispute process | Whether disputes go to mandatory arbitration, where, under whose rules, who pays, and whether class actions are waived. Common, enforceable, and worth reading before rather than after. |
The point almost nobody makes.
Piers, tiebacks, carbon fiber and drainage installed into a house very likely fall outside federal warranty law (the rule text is quoted below).
If the Act does not apply, neither do its disclosure protections, and the document you signed is the whole of your rights.
No FTC opinion or court decision settles this for foundation repair, so read your warranty as though it does.
What to ask before you sign
When does the term commence?
What if the house settles where you did not place piers?
Specifically: drainage and grading maintenance, plumbing leaks, later work by others, failure to register a transfer.
The full checklist is on choosing a foundation contractor.
What to have ready
So the warranty can be read against what was meant to be done. See do you need an engineer.
The results for the contracting entity, including its registration date and status.
Including one from a company that no longer trades.
Made during the sale, so you can check whether each appears in the document.
Where this goes wrong
On the face of the FTC’s own rule, work integrated into a dwelling is outside the Magnuson-Moss Act, and so are warranties on a repairer’s workmanship. The contract is very likely all you have.
Whose lifetime, covering what, with which remedy, subject to which conditions. The word alone conveys almost nothing, and the FTC says so in its own guidance.
Transfer commonly requires a fee and notification inside a window that is easy to miss during a sale, and is sometimes limited to one transfer or to the immediate next owner.
It may supersede a stronger implied warranty you would otherwise have had. This is not theoretical — a state supreme court has so held.
Drainage maintenance and watering obligations are real conditions, and letting grading deteriorate can void cover without anyone telling you.
Re-driving a pier is one cost; reopening the floor, the excavation and putting the room back is frequently another, and frequently excluded.
A long warranty on the wrong repair is a long warranty on the wrong repair. It does not cover the house continuing to move for the reason nobody identified.
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Tell us about the work
Three short steps: the job, your home, and how to reach you. Nothing goes to a foundation company unless you agree.
A straight answer first. Matching is still being built, so this is not an instant quote. If a wall is moving or a door frame has racked out of square this week, call a structural engineer first.
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Questions
Is a lifetime foundation warranty worth anything?
Does federal warranty law protect a foundation repair?
What does "lifetime" mean on a foundation warranty?
Can signing a warranty leave me worse off?
Is a foundation repair warranty insured or bonded?
What happens to my warranty if the company goes out of business?
Are foundation companies prosecuted over warranties?
Can I cancel a foundation repair contract signed at home?
What must the contractor do under the Cooling-Off Rule?
Do I have to disclose a foundation repair when I sell?
Will a past foundation repair affect a buyer’s mortgage?
What paperwork should I keep after a foundation repair?
Written and audited by
HyreFoundation Research Desk
Primary-source research and fact checking
We read the model building code, the federal soil and moisture guidance and the insurer position ourselves, and we publish each figure with the document it came from and the date we retrieved it.
Where a number cannot be traced to a primary source, we say so instead of printing it. HyreFoundation does not inspect, engineer or repair foundations. Authorship is organizational: this desk, not a named persona.
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How this desk works
- Primary sources only. Code statements come from the International Residential Code, Chapter 4, as the model code. Soil statements come from USDA and USGS. Insurance statements come from the policy language and the Insurance Information Institute. We open the source rather than cite a blog that cites it.
- The code is a model, and adoption is local. Your jurisdiction adopts an edition and amends it, and foundation chapters are amended more than most because frost depth and soil are local facts. Every code figure says so.
- We hold no job data. We have no dataset of bids, pier counts or invoices, so no page claims an average from one. Calculators show the arithmetic and the inputs they assumed, and label the result as an estimate.
- We do not diagnose your house. A crack guide can tell you which pattern to measure and when to call a structural engineer. It cannot tell you whether your foundation is failing. An engineer on site does that work.
- We do not repair foundations, and we take no payment for placement, ranking or a favorable mention. Nobody buys a position on this site.
Authorship on this site is organizational: the analysis belongs to the desk rather than to a named individual, and we do not publish credentials we do not hold. Our editorial policy sets out how we source, date and correct what we publish.
Sources & retrieval dates
Information on this page is general and varies with soil, climate, foundation type, building code, insurance policy and circumstance.
It is not engineering, insurance or legal advice, and no page can tell you whether your house has a structural problem: that needs a licensed professional on site.
HyreFoundation is an independent foundation resource, not a repair contractor or an engineering firm, and does not perform, supervise or warrant foundation work.