Crawlspace Insulation
in Vancouver, BC

Vancouver's crawlspace work is dominated by the city's older residential housing stock — particularly in East Vancouver, Hastings-Sunrise, Grandview-Woodland, and Renfrew-Collingwood, where pre-war and early post-war homes on full perimeter foundations (many of them with crawlspaces rather than full basements) are common. These homes were built in an era when crawlspace ventilation was the design standard, and many have had little or no maintenance to the subfloor environment in the decades since. When we inspect crawlspaces in homes of this vintage, we routinely encounter original wood framing with significant moisture damage, corroded metal connectors, and mold colonies that have been growing unchecked for years.

The majority of homes in Surrey and the surrounding communities built before 2000 have fiberglass batt insulation installed between the floor joists in the crawlspace. When this insulation was new and dry, it provided reasonable thermal resistance. The problem is that fiberglass batts installed in a vented crawlspace environment in a high-rainfall climate like ours rarely stay dry. They absorb ambient moisture, sag out of their cavities, and gradually collapse onto the ground. Wet fiberglass insulation has essentially zero R-value, adds weight that can pull down on vapor barriers or staples, and provides a hospitable nesting environment for rodents.

For crawlspaces that are not being fully encapsulated, we install new unfaced fiberglass batts or mineral wool between the joists, but only after addressing the moisture conditions that destroyed the previous insulation. Installing fresh batts into a still-damp crawlspace environment means you'll be back in the same situation within a few years. Proper sequencing matters: drainage, vapor barrier, then insulation.