Per-pier pricing, whole-job ranges, and the costs that show up after you have already signed. Every figure here is attributed, and where the sources disagree we show you that instead of hiding it in an average.
There is no honest single answer, and any site that gives you one is guessing. What follows is every credible figure we could find, with who published it and why they might be wrong.
Foundation repair is priced per pier, so the pier count drives almost everything. A typical house needs somewhere roughly 15 to 25 supports, and interior piers - needed on roughly one house in ten - cost about 20% more each because of access and cleanup (Anchor Foundation Repair, a Central Texas contractor).
| Method | Reported per-pier range | Where the spread comes from |
|---|---|---|
| Pressed concrete | $700-$1,800 $1,000 (Angi) · $765-$1,100 (Olshan, a national repair company) · $1,000-$1,800 Texas (lead-gen site) · $700-$800 installed (Anchor, TX contractor) | Whether the quote is materials-only or installed, and whether the perimeter is easy to reach. |
| Steel push piers | $990-$3,000 ~$2,000 (Angi) · $990-$1,350 (Olshan) · $1,200-$3,000 Texas (lead-gen site) | Depth to refusal. A pier driven 12 feet and one driven 30 feet cost very different amounts. |
| Bell-bottom piers | $700-$800, +6-8% with access obstacles Anchor Foundation Repair (TX contractor). No independent source publishes bell-bottom pricing at all - it is largely Texas trade jargon. | Sidewalks, driveways and mature trees that have to come out and go back. |
| Helical piers | $1,500-$4,400 $2,000-$4,000, avg $3,000 (HomeGuide) · ~$3,000 (Angi) · $3,500-$4,400 (Olshan) · $1,500-$3,500 Texas (lead-gen site) | Load requirements and torque depth. The widest disagreement of any method. |
Note the size of those spreads. Steel piers are quoted anywhere from about a thousand dollars to three thousand, and no source explains why its figure differs from the others. That is not sloppiness on their part so much as a real feature of this trade: the same job genuinely does cost very different amounts depending on soil depth, access and who is quoting. It is also exactly why getting one bid tells you nothing.
National averages cluster around $5,000 for a typical repair - This Old House puts it at $5,179 with a $2,224-$8,134 range, and NerdWallet at "just over $5,000" with a $2,200-$8,100 range. Both figures describe partial work. A full perimeter lift is a different order of magnitude: This Old House gives $20,000-$23,000, and full foundation replacement runs from $20,000 into six figures.
For Central Texas specifically, one local contractor publishes tiers that are more useful than a national average because they separate method and severity (Anchor Foundation Repair):
These are not add-ons a contractor is hiding - they are genuinely separate work, and they are why a $9,000 quote becomes a $13,000 project.
| Item | Reported cost | When you need it |
|---|---|---|
| Hydrostatic plumbing test | $250-$600$250-$500 (TX plumbing company) · $350-$600 post-lift (lead-gen) · ~$300 (Anchor) | Before and after the lift. Moving a slab can break old cast iron, and some warranties are void without the test. |
| Under-slab plumbing repair | $2,000-$5,000Lead-gen site; no independent figure found | Only if the test finds a break. Not rare in houses over forty years old. |
| Structural engineer's report | $300-$1,500$300-$800 (lead-gen) · $499-$780 residential (Olshan) · $500-$1,200 Texas (lead-gen) · $1,500+ (NerdWallet) | Optional, and the best money on this list. See below. |
| Drainage correction | $1,000-$8,000$2,000-$6,000 interior with sump (lead-gen) · $2,800-$8,000 correction and re-grading (Olshan) · $1,000-$6,000 TX (lead-gen) | Often the actual fix. Piers stop the symptom; water management stops the cause. |
| Cosmetic repair after the lift | Budget 10-20% on topSingle lead-gen source; no other publisher quantifies this at all. Treat as a rule of thumb, not a price. | Drywall, doors, windows, brick and tile all move when the house does. |
| Permit | $35-$300$75-$150 (NerdWallet) · $35-$300 Texas (lead-gen) · $75-$250 DFW (TX contractor) | Most Texas cities require one, plus an engineer-sealed plan. |
A structural engineer who is not attached to a repair company will tell you whether you need piers at all, and how many. That is the single largest lever on the price, and it is being set by the person selling you the piers unless you intervene.
An independent DFW engineering firm makes the point plainly: a contractor's engineer "is often hired to approve the contractor's proposed work" (Thomas Engineering Consultants). Hiring your own - a few hundred to about fifteen hundred dollars - is small against a five-figure repair, and it is the only opinion in the process with no stake in the answer.
Across the 331 companies in this directory, 14% state that they work from an engineer's report. That is not a mark against the rest - many do and never mention it - but it is worth asking directly.
63% of the companies listed here advertise a free inspection, and NerdWallet notes the same industry-wide, adding the obvious caveat: contractors "may have financial incentive to overstate problems." A free inspection is a sales visit that happens to include an assessment. That is fine, as long as you treat it as one.
A licensed Texas home inspector lists the pressure tactics worth walking away from: claims of imminent collapse, discounts that expire today, and any contractor who discourages a second opinion (Super Inspector). More on that here.
All 331 companies in this directory, with what each one publishes about warranties, methods and financing.
It cannot tell you what your repair will cost. Nobody can, from a webpage. What it can do is stop you being surprised: by the spread between bids, by the plumbing test, by the drywall work afterwards, and by the fact that the person recommending twenty piers is the person selling twenty piers.
Get an independent engineer. Get three bids. Ask every one of them the transferability question. Then decide.