Everything You Need to Know About Sump Pumps

Southeast Michigan sits on clay-heavy soil with a high water table in many areas. When it rains hard — or when spring snowmelt saturates the ground — that water looks for the lowest point it can find. In most homes, that's the basement.

A sump pump is a submersible pump installed in a pit at the lowest point of the basement floor. When groundwater rises to a certain level, a float switch activates the pump and it discharges the water away from the foundation through a discharge line.

Here's what most homeowners don't know: a sump pump has a lifespan of 7 to 10 years under normal use. If yours is older than that, it's not a question of whether it will fail — it's whether it will fail during a dry spell or during a major storm when you need it most.

We recommend two things for every home with a sump pump: a battery backup unit and an alarm. The backup unit runs on a 12-volt marine battery and kicks in automatically if the primary pump fails or if the power goes out during a storm — which is exactly when you need the pump running. The alarm alerts you if the water level rises above normal, giving you time to respond before the basement floods.

We install, replace, and service sump pumps across all 7 Metro Detroit locations. If you're not sure how old your pump is or when it was last serviced, call us. A sump pump inspection takes about 30 minutes and costs far less than a flooded basement.