How do you prevent moisture from getting into a basement footing?

Great question, and yes,moisture from the ground will be absorbed through the footing of a basementfoundation if it isn’t protected. There is usually some thought put towards protecting foundation walls from moisture in the ground, but footings seem to be neglected for some reason. Just to clarify, is it safe to assume that you are building new? There really isn’t any way do it after the fact, which sort of goes without saying : ) So, running with the assumption that you are building a new home and not renovating, this page about basement construction may be an even more valuable read for you.

Building better basements: how to insulate your basement properly

In there you will see a few different techniques for insulating basements, whether that is insulation on the interior, the exterior, or both. You can expand the drawing and see greater details, but the short story is that you need to doinstall a capillary break between the footing and the foundation wall, which you can see on the diagram. There are products specifically designed for that purpose, but in reality it can be done by placing a 6 mil poly vapor barrier on top of the footing before the forms for the foundation walls are installed. So once the concrete walls are poured, moisture can’t pass between the two.

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