Plumbing Leak Repair in Portland — Behind Walls, Under Sinks, Through Ceilings

If your only clue is a Portland Water Bureau bill that jumped sharply with nothing visibly wet anywhere in the house, that's the case for a dedicated leak-detection company — one that runs acoustic, sonic, and thermal equipment to find fully invisible leaks. We don't carry that gear, but we know good ones in Portland and we'll refer you. Once they've pinpointed the location, call us back and we handle the spot repair. Anything else — a stain, a damp baseboard, water bubbling under paint, or a measurable pressure drop — and we trace it ourselves on the same visit.

Same-day appointments Monday–Friday 8am–4pm. We're based on SE Franklin Street in Portland, so most of the city is a short drive — calling in the morning typically gets you a same-day slot. We give you a specific arrival window when you book — not a four-hour range. After-hours calls go through our partner network and may include a dispatch fee; we tell you that before anyone rolls a truck.

In a newer drywall home it's straightforward — wet spot or stain tells us where to start, we close fixture valves to isolate hot vs. cold and supply vs. drain, pressure-test the suspect line, and confirm with a thermal camera before cutting. In an older inner-east bungalow with original lath and plaster, we plan the access cut more carefully: framing patterns are less predictable, the patch is more involved, and a guess in the wrong place is more expensive to put back. Either way the goal is one clean access hole at the localized spot — not a fishing expedition.

Yes — for single-point repair once the leak has been located. Mid-century slab builds in Hillsdale, Multnomah Village, and the west side of SW Portland are where we see most of these, almost always on hot supply lines on post-1970 builds. If you can see the wet spot, hear the running water, or you've already had a leak-detection specialist pinpoint the spot, we cut, repair (or re-route), and put it back. What we don't do is run the sonic equipment to find a slab leak you can't trace — for that we refer to a leak-detection company we trust.

One leak in one place is a repair, full stop. But when pinhole leaks start showing up in different rooms — especially on galvanized supply piping common in pre-1940 inner-east bungalows, or copper that's 40+ years old — the pipe material itself is failing, not just one fitting. At that point, repairing each new leak as it comes is more expensive over a few years than a partial or whole-house repipe. We give you the math on both paths and let you decide.

No — drywall patching, mudding, sanding, texture, and paint is a different trade with its own skill set. We make access cuts as small and clean as the repair allows. Most homeowners handle the patch themselves or hire a painter to close it out; if you'd rather hand it to a drywall finisher, we're happy to pass along a referral. Either way, we tell you exactly where the openings will be before any cutting starts.

Cost depends on what we find. A failing supply stop or compression fitting under a sink sits on the lower end. A leak behind a wall that needs localization and a single-point pipe repair is more. In older Portland homes the two factors that move the number most are access (lath-and-plaster takes longer to open cleanly than drywall) and depth in the wall — a leak two studs in costs more than one right behind the access panel. The estimate is free, the price is by the job, and you see the full number after diagnosis before any work starts. Business-hour pricing all day; after-hours calls go through our partner network and may include a dispatch fee, which we tell you before anyone rolls a truck.