Leak Detection in Boulder, CO
If your water meter is still spinning after you've shut off every fixture in the house, or your water bill jumped for no reason you can explain, you likely have a hidden leak somewhere in the line, slab, or wall. Boulder Express Plumbing uses electronic leak-tracing equipment to find it without tearing your house apart to look.
Why It Happens Here.
Boulder's expansive clay soil is a real factor here. As the ground swells and shrinks with moisture, it puts uneven stress on buried service lines and slab plumbing, and a pinhole leak that starts small can take months to show up as a wet spot or a bill spike. Any repair we make follows the material and workmanship standards set out in the International Plumbing Code, which Colorado has adopted statewide.
Signs to Watch For.
Water meter still moving with every fixture in the house off.
A water bill noticeably higher than your typical usage.
A warm or damp spot on the floor with no obvious source.
The sound of running water when nothing is turned on.
A musty smell or unexplained mold in one area of the house.
Need Help Right Now?
A licensed technician can be dispatched today.
The Meter Is Running and I Don't Know Why.
This is the single most common way this call starts: nothing visibly wrong, but the meter won't stop turning, or the water bill from the utility jumped well above a normal month. That pattern almost always means the leak is somewhere you can't see it, under a slab, inside a wall, or in the buried line between the meter and the house.
Before we schedule anything invasive, we isolate which side of the system the leak is on. Shutting off the main valve inside the house and watching whether the meter keeps moving tells us in minutes whether the leak is in your plumbing or in the service line itself.
How We Track Down the Cause.
We use acoustic listening equipment to trace pipe noise through walls and slab, along with electronic leak-tracing gear for line leaks that don't make audible noise. For sewer-adjacent leaks, we can run a video camera down the line to see the actual condition of the pipe rather than guessing from symptoms alone.
The goal is always to pinpoint the leak's location before anyone opens a wall or cuts concrete. Guessing and cutting exploratory holes costs you more in drywall and flooring repair than the diagnostic work would have.
Your Repair Options.
Spot Repair.
- Once the leak is pinpointed, we open only the section that needs it.
- Fastest and least invasive option when the rest of the line is sound.
- Doesn't address a line that's failing in multiple places.
Re-Route or Reline.
- Considered when the pipe material itself is failing (old galvanized, for example).
- Avoids repeated future leaks in the same aging section.
- More upfront cost, less risk of a repeat call next year.
What This Actually Costs.
We don't publish flat prices because the factors above genuinely change the number. Free on-site estimates cover non-emergency work, and for active emergencies we give you an upfront price before any repair begins. Call (303) 552-3896 for your real number.
Questions We Get Often.
Yes, for non-emergency diagnostic visits. If it's an active emergency leak, we give you an upfront price before any repair work begins, but the situation itself gets addressed immediately rather than waiting on a separate estimate visit.
Not to find it. Our equipment locates the leak acoustically or electronically first. Cutting only happens once we know exactly where to cut, and only for the repair itself, not the search.
A straightforward isolation check, confirming whether the leak is on the house side or the service-line side, often takes under an hour. Pinpointing an exact location under a slab or inside a wall can take longer depending on how the pipes are routed.
Often Booked Together
A leak that traces back to under the slab gets its own dedicated approach, covered on our slab leak repair page. If the source turns out to be the tank itself, see water heater repair for that diagnosis, and a leak found in the yard or main line often points toward sewer line repair instead.
A leak that's costing you money every day doesn't get better on its own. Call Boulder Express Plumbing and we'll get a technician out to pinpoint it properly the first time.