Open 24/7 for emergencies
McLean has the two things that break sewer laterals: houses old enough to be on clay or cast iron, and the mature oaks and tulip poplars that make the neighborhoods worth living in. Roots find clay joints. We put a camera in the line, show you the footage, and line the pipe from the inside wherever the pipe will take it.
Tell us what the line is doing. We’ll come look before anyone talks price.
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Licensed and insuredVirginia Class A contractor #2705192276
24/7 emergency serviceOften same-day, and we will tell you honestly when we can get there.
Our own plumbers, our own trucksNobody here is a subcontractor with a magnet on the door
The price is settled before the workYou see the number in writing before anything is taken apart
The short version
A backed-up main line in McLean is rarely a surprise once the camera is in it. Three causes cover most of what we pull up here, and each one has a different right answer.
Vitrified clay was the standard sewer pipe for decades and it comes in short sections with a joint every few feet. Every joint is a seam, and a root only needs a seam and moisture. This is the most common thing our camera finds under a McLean front yard, and it’s also the best case, because a lined pipe has no joints for the roots to come back to.
Inside the house and out to the connection, older cast iron rusts from the inside. The pipe is still round on the outside while the opening has narrowed to a fraction of what it was, and every clog comes back faster than the last one.
Ground settles, especially over a line that was backfilled in a hurry. Waste sits in the low spot instead of running through, and the line clogs at the same place forever. This is the one case where lining is the wrong answer and we’ll say so.
What to expect
Nobody quotes a sewer line they haven’t seen. A self-leveling camera runs the lateral from the cleanout, and a locator marks the fault on the ground in your yard, so you know the depth and the spot before anyone talks about money.
Roots at a joint, a belly holding water, a crushed section, a separated clay hub. You see which one it is on the screen, at your house, and you keep a copy.
If the host pipe is intact enough to line, we cure a new pipe inside the old one and the yard stays shut. If the line is collapsed, badly bellied or offset past the point a liner can bridge, we say so and we dig that section.
The county plumbing permit is pulled, the work is inspected before it gets covered (Virginia USBC 113.3(5) requires that), and the ground goes back the way we found it.
Your lateral is yours, all the way to the main. Fairfax County puts it in writing: the sanitary sewer house lateral is the property owner’s from the building to the county main, connection included, and the county won’t come locate it for you. That’s true even for the run under the street, which is the part that surprises people. It’s also the reason a camera inspection before you buy a McLean house is worth what it costs, because a standard home inspection doesn’t include one.
What actually happens down there
This is what the camera finds under a McLean front yard more often than anything else, and why a jointless liner ends the cycle instead of resetting it.
Cutaway illustrations from In-Line Renewal Solutions, who make the lining system we run.
The question everybody asks second
Second thing every homeowner asks after a sewer quote. The base policy almost certainly won’t pay to replace a worn-out lateral. Two endorsements can, and one of them Virginia law requires your insurer to offer you.
A standard homeowners policy covers the house against sudden accidents, and then names the things it won’t pay for. On the ISO HO-3 form, the standard most policies here are built from, that list includes wear and tear, deterioration, rust and corrosion, and settling. Those four are exactly how a sewer lateral dies. So a line that failed because it got old is generally denied, and not because your carrier is being difficult.
This is the one most homeowners here don’t know. Virginia Code 38.2-2120 requires insurers to offer coverage for water that backs up through sewers or drains, and the State Corporation Commission’s own consumer guide tells you to make sure you get it. It isn’t in the base policy. The endorsement covers the mess a backup makes inside the house, and the standard version starts at $5,000 of back-up coverage with steps up to $25,000.
A separate endorsement, and the useful part is what it covers: carriers writing it in Virginia list wear and tear, rust, freezing and tree root invasion as covered causes, which is precisely what the base policy excludes. It typically pays for the excavation and putting the yard back, too. Verified limits: Erie writes $10,000 or $25,000, Liberty Mutual writes $12,000 with a $500 deductible. Ask your agent what yours is, because the number moves by carrier.
Two of them, both in the carriers’ own footnotes. A blockage with no physical damage to the line isn’t a claim, so roots that have cracked the pipe are covered and a grease clog isn’t. And the pipe running under your house is usually excluded, because the endorsement covers the buried line outside the building. Worth knowing before you assume you’re covered.
Where your responsibility ends and where your coverage ends are two different lines on the map. The standard endorsement covers the buried line on your own property. Your responsibility, in most of Northern Virginia, runs all the way to the main, including the part under the street. Read the endorsement rather than assuming the two match. We don’t file or negotiate insurance claims, and anyone in this trade who offers to is doing you no favors. You get the camera footage, a written scope of what failed and why, and dated photos. That’s what an adjuster wants, and it is yours whichever way the claim goes.
The rest of what we do
A sewer lateral is the pipe that gets the attention, because when it fails the whole house stops. It’s one of several we work on, and on a lot of jobs it isn’t even the one that turns out to be worst.
The lateral is the pipe everybody notices, because when it fails the whole house stops. It’s not the only pipe we replace. Drain and waste repipes, water service lines from the meter to the house, and the supply piping inside the walls are all the same crew and the same license.
We repipe in copper where a homeowner wants copper, and in PEX where it’s the better answer for the run, the budget or the walls we would otherwise have to open. On the drain side that usually means replacing failed cast iron or galvanized with PVC. What we won’t do is decide it for you off a price sheet: the right material depends on the run, the water and how much of the house has to come apart.
Most repipe work runs somewhere between $1,000 and $12,000, depending on how much of the house has to come apart. A section under a fixture sits at the bottom. Repiping the horizontal runs through a basement or crawl space sits at the top. Water service line work, meter to house, generally runs $3,500 to $8,000.
From about $17 a month at 0% APR for 60 months, the whole price financed, on approved credit. How financing works
More often than you’d think. A camera call for a slow drain finds cast iron that’s scaled shut inside the house as well as roots in the lateral outside it. You get told about both, and you get to decide what gets done now and what waits.
Trees, streams and the rules that actually exist
Most of what gets said about permits and protected trees in Northern Virginia is wrong in the homeowner’s favor. The one situation where it genuinely matters is a stream.
Fairfax County puts it plainly: in general there are no laws or regulations in Virginia that stop you removing individual trees on your own property. Arlington says no permit is required on private property in most cases. So the tree in the way of a trench is usually your call, not the county’s. There’s one exception that catches people out, and it’s below.
If any part of your yard sits within 100 feet of a stream, you’re probably in a Resource Protection Area, and the rules invert. Fairfax County’s own wording is that removal of trees or any type of vegetation there’s prohibited without a waiver. Arlington counts taking out a tree as small as three inches across in an RPA as land disturbance. Alexandria reviews work in an RPA no matter how small the job. This is Chesapeake Bay law, not tree law, and it doesn’t care that the tree is healthy.
RPAs exist in Arlington, Fairfax County, Prince William, Alexandria, the City of Fairfax and Falls Church, plus the towns inside those counties. Loudoun County isn’t in Tidewater Virginia, so Ashburn, Sterling and Leesburg have no RPAs at all. If you’re near a stream in Fairfax, the waiver is free and usually turns around in about a week. It’s a phone call, not a crisis, as long as somebody makes it before the machine shows up.
Fairfax County’s own engineering manual treats a tree with 40 percent or more of its critical root zone disturbed as not worth trying to preserve. That’s the number behind a thing we see constantly: the oak survives the job, looks fine all summer, and dies the following season. Roots cut cleanly do better than roots torn, which is why an open trench past a mature tree is the part of the plan worth arguing about.
If your trench line runs through an RPA, start with a phone call. The Chesapeake Bay rules exempt water and sewer lines owned or permitted by a local government. Your lateral is privately owned, but the repair does pull a county permit, and no locality has published which way that cuts for a homeowner. Fairfax Land Development Services is 703-324-1720. Arlington takes RPA questions at rpareview@arlingtonva.us. The reason we lead with lining: a repair that never opens the ground doesn’t start any of these conversations.
Straight answers
Ranges for sewer work in Northern Virginia, so you walk into any quote knowing the neighborhood. Your line is its own thing and we price it off the camera footage. More detail in our sewer cost guide.
$89 when we’re already at your house on another call. The cheapest useful hour in plumbing.
Generally $500 to $1,700. The spread is real: a standalone scope often means clearing the line enough to get the camera through first.
Generally $550 to $1,650, covering snaking, augering and jetting. If you’re paying this twice a year, you’re renting a problem instead of fixing it.
Generally $7,500 to $9,000. That runs above what the national cost guides quote for this area, which is worth knowing before you budget from one.
or $125/mo at 0% APR for 60 months
Quoted off the camera footage, because length, diameter and bends decide it. We publish no flat lining price because we won’t print a number we can’t stand behind.
Price range
$7,500-$9,000
8yrs @ 7.99%
$106/mo
15yrs @ 9.99%
$81/mo
Monthly figures on the starting price, the whole price financed, on approved credit. The lender sets the final terms. How financing works
Where we go
Chantilly shop, McLean is a regular run. Single family, townhouse and HOA common line work in and around:
A McLean-area lateral opened up at the fault the camera found. One section, located first, instead of a trench down the length of the yard.
Questions we hear every week
You do. McLean is unincorporated Fairfax County, and the county’s published rule is that the house lateral belongs to the property owner from the building to the county main, including the connection and the portion under the street.
Fairfax County charges $77.70 for a sewer plumbing permit under its current fee schedule. If the work has to cut a VDOT-maintained street, and most residential streets here are, that adds a state permit on top. Anyone quoting you a four-figure permit line isn’t reading the schedule.
Recurring backups at the same interval almost always mean the obstruction was never removed, only punched through. Roots regrow, scale keeps narrowing, a belly keeps collecting. Get the camera in before you pay for a fourth clearing.
That’s exactly the case lining exists for. The line is renewed through existing access, so the driveway doesn’t come up and the root systems that made the yard worth having stay intact.
We quote lining off the camera footage, because the price follows the length of the run, the diameter and how many bends are in it. What we won’t do is print a lining number we can’t stand behind: the trade benchmark published by In-Line Renewal Solutions, the lining system manufacturer, averages about $3,800 for a four to eight-foot spot repair, and that’s a contractor average across the country, not a SwiftPro quote. Digging and replacing a sewer line in Northern Virginia generally runs $7,500 to $9,000.
$89 as an add-on when we’re already at your house on another call. Booked on its own, a scope visit generally runs $500 to $1,700, because a standalone visit often includes clearing the line far enough to get the camera through.
In most of Northern Virginia it’s yours, from the building all the way to the main, including the part under the street. Fairfax County and Arlington both put it that way in writing. There are real exceptions: the Town of Herndon draws the private portion from the property line to the house only, and the City of Fairfax reimburses part of a lateral repair. Ask us and we’ll tell you which rule your address falls under.
A camera inspection is an hour or so. A lining job on a residential lateral is usually a single day, with the cure itself measured in minutes. An excavation and replacement depends on depth, what’s on top of it, and how fast the permit and inspection move.
That’s the point of lining: the line is renewed through existing access, so the lawn, the driveway and the mature trees stay where they are. Even when we do have to dig, it’s the failed section, located first with the camera, not a trench down the length of the property.
Both, plus everything either side of them. Sewer lining, sewer excavation and replacement, drain and waste repipes, water service lines from the meter to the house, and supply repiping in copper or PEX. Lining is the option we lead with on a sewer lateral because it saves the yard when the pipe allows it, not because it’s the only tool we own.
For the pipe itself, usually not on the base policy. The ISO HO-3 form that most policies here are built from excludes wear and tear, deterioration, rust and settling, which is how laterals actually fail. Two endorsements change the answer: water backup coverage, which Virginia law requires your insurer to offer you, pays for the damage a backup does inside the house, and service line coverage pays to repair or replace the buried line and put the yard back. Neither is automatic. Both have to be on the policy before anything goes wrong.
Four questions. Do I have water backup coverage, and at what limit. Do I have service line or buried utility line coverage. Where does that coverage stop, at my property line or at the main. And is a root intrusion that’s cracked the pipe treated as physical damage, since a blockage on its own generally isn’t. We don’t file claims and we won’t pretend to, but we will hand you the camera footage and a written scope so you’re asking with evidence in hand.
Yes, and know that a standard home inspection doesn’t include it. InterNACHI’s standards of practice don’t require an inspector to scope the sewer, so on a 1960s or 1970s Northern Virginia house it’s a separate call and a cheap one against what a failed lateral costs.
Keep reading
Backed up right now, or a quote in hand you don’t trust? We’ll camera the line, show you what’s in it, and give you the lining answer and the digging answer side by side.
SwiftPro Heating, Cooling & Plumbing
4230 Lafayette Center Dr N, Chantilly, VA 20151
44679 Endicott Dr, Suite 211, Ashburn, VA 20147
Virginia Class A contractor license #2705192276
Licensed Class A #2705192276 · Based in Chantilly, serving all of Northern Virginia