Wood Rot Repair

Houston does not need a leak to rot wood. It only needs the wood to stay damp.

Wood rot is a fungus. It needs wood, oxygen and moisture, and it becomes active at a wood moisture content somewhere above about twenty percent. In a climate with our humidity, rainfall and long warm season, anything wooden on the outside of your house that is not properly sealed is sitting close to that threshold for months at a time.

Which is why Houston houses rot in places that would be fine almost anywhere else, and why homeowners here find it so much earlier than they expect to.

Where we find it

Fascia boards, behind and below the gutters. Usually first.
Soffits, particularly at corners and where they meet the wall.
Window sills and the trim beneath them, where water sits on a horizontal surface.
Door frames and thresholds, especially on an unprotected elevation.
Porch columns at the base, where they meet concrete. Concrete wicks moisture and holds it against the end grain, which is the most absorbent part of the timber.
Deck and porch framing, at joist ends and ledger boards.
Garage door jambs, at the bottom six inches, where the driveway splashes.
Roof rafter tails, behind a fascia that has already gone.
Siding, at the bottom course and around penetrations.

The two kinds, and why the difference matters

Dry rot is the misleading name. The fungus spreads through wood at relatively low moisture and can travel some distance from the original wet spot, which is why the damage frequently extends beyond what you can see. It leaves wood dry, cracked into cubes, and crumbling.

Wet rot stays where the water is, and the wood is soft, dark and spongy. It is more contained, so the repair is usually more predictable.

Either way the rule is the same: cut back to sound wood, past the visible damage, because leaving active fungus behind a new board is guaranteeing a second repair.

Why filler is not a repair

Epoxy consolidants and fillers have a legitimate use: small, contained damage on a piece worth preserving, such as an original window sill on a Heights bungalow where matching the profile is expensive and the rest of the timber is sound. What they cannot do is restore structure or stop an active fungus. Filler over rot, sanded and painted, looks perfect for a year and hides the spread. It is extremely common on houses being prepared for sale.

What we do

Probe the whole area, not the visible patch. A screwdriver tells you where sound wood starts, and that line is usually further out than the stain suggests.
Find the water. Every repair starts with why. A blocked gutter, a missing drip edge, a failed flashing, sprinklers hitting the wall, a downspout discharging next to a column, grade sitting too high against the siding. Fix the board without fixing that and you have bought a few years.
Cut back past the damage to solid material.
Replace with matched material, or with fiber cement or PVC where the location keeps failing and the profile allows.
Prime every face before it goes up, including the back and the cut ends. End grain absorbs water many times faster than face grain, and an unprimed cut end is the most common reason a repair rots again.
Caulk and paint properly, sealing the joints the water was using.

The things that keep causing it

Worth checking on your own house this week: gutters that overflow, downspouts discharging against the foundation or a column, sprinkler heads spraying the siding, soil or mulch piled above the bottom of the siding, shrubs grown tight against the wall holding moisture in, and any horizontal wooden surface without a slope or a drip detail.

What it costs, and how you can check

Every job on this page is priced Cost Plus. You see the supplier invoice for the materials, the crew hours at our published rate, the permit and disposal at what they actually cost, and one service fee of 20 to 30 percent set by job complexity and locked before anything starts. There is no second number and no change order conversation after the fact. The full breakdown is here.

Common Questions

Can rotted wood be repaired instead of replaced?

Small, contained damage on a piece worth saving can be consolidated with epoxy. Anything structural, anything soft through its thickness, and anything where the fungus is still active needs cutting out. Filler over active rot hides it, it does not stop it.

How far does rot spread?

Dry rot in particular travels through wood well beyond the visibly damaged area, which is why we probe rather than trusting the stain. Cutting back to sound wood is the whole job.

Should I replace with PVC or fiber cement?

In locations that keep failing, yes, and it is usually worth the cost difference. On visible trim with a distinctive profile, matching the original material often matters more, particularly in a historic district.

Is wood rot the same as termite damage?

No, though they look similar from a distance and they often appear together, because damp wood attracts termites. If we see anything suggesting insects we will tell you and recommend an inspection. We are not a pest control company.

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Free inspection, photographed and written up, with a line-by-line quote inside one business day.

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Or call (281) 305-8669