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The plain version
What whole-home repiping is
A repipe replaces your home's water supply system — every hot and cold line from the main shutoff to the last fixture — in one planned project. It is the endgame for original galvanized steel that has rusted closed from the inside, and for aging copper whose pinhole leaks have become a genre rather than an event.
The two failure stories are different and both end here. Galvanized pipe strangles: decades of internal rust narrow the bore until an upstairs shower fades every time someone opens a tap downstairs, and the rust it sheds is the brown tint your white laundry keeps finding. Copper perforates: water chemistry and time produce pinholes, and pinholes arrive in sequence rather than alone.
Note what a repipe is not. This is the pressurized supply system only — the pipes bringing clean water in. Drains and the sewer are a separate system with separate failure modes, and they are the other half of what we do.
When you need it
Any one of these is reason enough to have the line looked at.
- Pressure visibly drops when a second fixture is opened
- Brown or rusty tint on the first draw in the morning
- Pinhole leaks appearing as a series, each closer to the last
- Original galvanized supply lines in a mid-century house
- An insurer or escrow inspection flagging the plumbing's age or material
On the day
How the job runs
Map the system
Every fixture, run, and access path is planned before anything is opened. A repipe is choreography, and the plan is what keeps you living in the house while it happens.
Run the new lines
New supply runs go in through walls, attic, and crawl space along the planned routes, with water down only in scheduled windows rather than for days.
Switch over and pressure test
Fixtures move to the new system, the old lines are abandoned dead in place, and the whole system holds a pressure test before it counts as plumbing.
Inspect and close up
The city inspection signs off, then the access openings are patched. You end with documented, permitted, warrantied supply plumbing.
Money, plainly
What it costs
A repipe is priced by the house: fixture count, number of stories, and how reachable the runs are — attics and crawl spaces are friendlier than closed ceilings. Material is a genuine fork, and we will walk you through copper versus PEX without dogma rather than quoting only the one we prefer.
Insist that drywall repair appears in the scope, from us or from anyone else you ask. A repipe bid that omits patching is not a cheaper repipe; it is a quote for a house full of open walls with the finish work still ahead of you.
Why Rooter-X for this
Repiping rewards planning discipline more than any other service we offer, and that is our temperament — routes mapped, water-down windows scheduled, and patch count agreed before the first opening is cut.
We are comfortable in both copper and PEX and will tell you plainly which suits your house and budget. The material argument online is mostly tribal; your house does not belong to a tribe.
Asked constantly
Questions we hear
Copper or PEX — which should I actually choose?
PEX installs faster, costs less, tolerates a freeze better, and its flexibility means fewer fittings buried in walls. Copper is proven over generations, rigid, and unbothered by UV or rodents. Most repipes here now run PEX with copper stub-outs at fixtures. We install either well, so the honest answer depends on your budget and your house's access rather than on ideology.
How long will my house be a construction zone?
Typical single-family repipes run a few days to a week of active work: new lines first, switch-over, inspection, then patching. Water is off only in scheduled windows, so most households stay home throughout. The patch-and-paint tail usually feels longest, which is why it gets a defined end date in the scope.
Do I really have to repipe, or can I keep fixing leaks?
On a first or second pinhole in otherwise decent copper, fixing them is perfectly rational. The math turns when leaks become a pattern — each repair buys less time than the last, and every event carries a risk of water damage that costs more than the repair did. Galvanized with measurable pressure loss is further along than that; it does not improve, it only narrows.
Does a repipe include the drains or the sewer?
No. A repipe is the pressurized supply system. Drains and the sewer line are a separate system, and if they also deserve attention the sensible move is to camera them while walls are already open, so you can decide about both with real information instead of coordinating two disruptions.
Will the work be permitted and inspected?
Yes — a whole-home repipe is permitted work with a city inspection before walls are closed. That protects you at resale as much as at installation: documented, inspected supply plumbing is an asset on a disclosure form instead of a question the buyer's inspector gets to raise.
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