The first foundation crack I ever got called out on turned out to be two different problems wearing the same disguise: settling on one side, water pressure on the other, and whoever patched it first treated them as one. I’ve spent fourteen years in residential construction, the last nine of them almost entirely on foundations and basements, backed by a Construction Management degree from the Durham School of Architectural Engineering and Construction at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. Retaining walls, drainage, waterproofing… none of it looks urgent until the day water shows up where it shouldn’t, and by then, it costs more to fix.
