Plumber told me today that a water leak was a result of a “crushed sewer line “ The bathroom tub, toilet, and vanity will have to be removed to repair/replace sewer line under slab. . This is also causing damage to flooring in bathroom and possibly other areas. It was recommended that I have a restoration company of service area to do demolition and rebuild.

I will be getting multiple estimates. The first estimate is:

$1834 plumbing

$2300 demolition/removal, cleaning, disinfecting, etc.

$5000 repairs

Where is the water showing up at? Seems VERY ODD that a cracked sewer line below a slab would be producing dampness above the slab in the bathroom.

Is broke to the point that it is clogging toilet solids and it's backing up?

Did you watch the video of the snake going down the drain line and see the damage yourself?

What type of drain line is it? PVC?

The water is showing up in the backyard. The soil is very wet. The plumber did not use a camera. He asked the tenant to turn on the shower and flush the toilet which caused water to gush out through the brick. Their is a little water around the toilet and the tub but the tenant did not notify me.

You need to get a camera down the sewer line and watch the video screen while they do it so you can see the damage.

What can you tell us about the AC install? If the AC install dd damage it, it would be on their insurance.

I'm guessing the AC work was outside so it shouldn't require the demo of a bathroom.

You need the camera. How do you get from broken line under slab to water coming up in yards? what does ACinstall have to do with sewer line. As NE said camera and by a different company.

I've seen one bad slab sewer line and that was from plumber using wrong snake- forced t so hard broke line.

Something is wrong. Where in GA are you?

my guy is in williamson not sure if he would go all that way up north. Something is wrong with this equation?

I am a licensed plumbing contractor and a landlord/investor/manager.

Most of the time the sewer pipe under a slab is made of a hard "metal" and only turns to "clay" when the metal pipes exits the building foot print and is under just "dirt".

For a metal sewer pipe to be crushed is hard to understand in your case. However I don't know how old your property is or where it's located.

Point of fact, if your bathroom is located along the side of your property, not a inside bathroom with no windows, then the pipe can be reached by digging from the outside into the bathroom area to get to the drain.

I have a triplex that the main sewer line developed a problem and instead of breaking up the slab, I tunneled under the foundation of the property along one side and ran a new sewer line three feet out. This was for three bathrooms. I only had to dig two feet under the building to reach the old sewer line.

I have a building with clay pipe being invaded by roots.

I rented a camera and snake at HD. Was able to scope it myself and then clear out the roots. I do this annually along with putting the chemicals down the sewer line.

You definitely want to watch a live feed of the scope. Unscrupulous contractors use a recorded video of 'your' property to bilk you out of funds for pretend problems.

BTW the scope I rented had a signal finder that you could

use to trace the pipe. Well worth the money.

You need another plumber.

If they flushed and saw the water come up in the yard, I'm tempted to think the sewer line is shallow.

One third of the landlords here would take a shovel and reach it within a few hours. I know I've had a few very shallow sewer lines.

All the moisture in the bathroom is most likely there for other reasons. We know that the shower and the flushing exit in the yard...so there is no back up into the home.

I would reach out to another plumber....and not the big advertisers.

This is a textbook example of why you need to know how to do this stuff in case you ever have to hire it out.

It's OK to hire things out, but if you don't know what you're hiring out and you don't know what you're doing, you're going to spend $5000 to remodel a bathroom, because some bozo told you too.

NE PA you bring up a very good point. would like to expand on that.

Following up to my sewer issue… After 4-plumber’s gave me estimates, I decided to use the one who put a camera down the drain. He confirmed that there was a hole and a crack in the sewer line under the slab in the kitchen. Once he opened up the cement he discovered that there was some rusting to the cast iron pipe that was not detected by the camera. He advised that other parts of the sewer line may be bad and that I may have trouble down the line. At this time I just decided to fix the obvious problem in the kitchen with the sewer line crack.