Crawl Space Science: What to Have Done... and Why

There is no shred of evidence or science that says vented dirt crawl spaces make sense – and tons of evidence, right before our eyes, that says they are a serious problem. Yet over 250,000 new homes and thousands of additions are built each year with dirt crawl spaces. There are now 26 million of them. The building code not only allows dirt crawl spaces, but actually made the problem much worse by requiring them to be vented. Homeowners, and the U.S. economy are paying the price in so many ways. It’s time for something to be done – right now.

Your home costs money to operate – to heat and cool, and to maintain. A vented dirt crawl space raises your heating and cooling cost 15% (to 25%) every month, and makes it very likely you’ll have a big expense for mold removal and/or rotted wood replacement (guaranteed in the Southeast US).

And if it’s worth owning a home with a dirt crawl space at all, it is certainly worth fixing...