Sill damage is usually due to water or termites. For this home in New Orleans’ Black Pearl neighborhood, the sill was damaged by a plumbing leak inside the walls. The leak went on for a very long time, unknown to the homeowner, and after some months or years the sill beneath the leak became damaged. The homeowner noticed the problem only when the outer walls of the home began to bulge, a problem that was caused by the damaged sill starting to sink.

A sill, ideally stays straight throughout its life and holds the house’s joists straight, or level. When the sill is no longer straight, everything above it—joists, wall framing, floors, and even the home’s roof—can begin to go off-kilter. But unlike other parts of your home, where you can just “take a look” to see if something is wrong, sills are always hidden under the siding. Often, you won’t know something is wrong with a sill until a professional comes to take a look.

In this particular case, we were able to find the cause of the problem and schedule a sill replacement. A sill replacement requires us to use jacks to support the house while we remove the old sill. Some jacks are there just to support the house, while others are there to jack up the house by a fraction of an inch, just enough for us to pull out the old sill. (You can even be inside the house while we do this, and probably won’t notice a thing!)

Then we put in a new sill, and made sure everything was straight and supported.

Now that the sills are solid again, the homeowner can focus on other things.

Sill repair and replacement is best done by experienced pros with professional-grade equipment. At Richard Earls Construction, we’ve done hundreds of sill replacements for many happy customers. Give us a call if you think you might need your sills replaced.