Water heater replacement
The single most common call in Vaughan, because so much of the city hit the fifteen-year mark at once.
Vaughan
A plumber for every corner of Vaughan
Vaughan isn't one place. A stone farmhouse in Kleinburg and a Patterson townhouse finished last decade share a mailing address and almost nothing else. We're based in Maple, near the middle of it, and we work all of it.
What Vaughan plumbing actually looks like
Vaughan was farmland and a handful of villages until the building started, and then it went up faster than almost anywhere else in the country. That history is why the plumbing here splits so cleanly in two.
Most of the city went up from the 1990s onward. Those homes are now somewhere between 20 and 35 years old — which sounds young, and is exactly the age when the cheap parts start letting go. The water heater is on its second or third unit. The little chrome shut-off valves under the sinks have seized solid. If the house has a sump pump, the original is long past its expected life whether or not it's still humming.
Then there are the old cores — Woodbridge village, Maple village, Kleinburg, and Thornhill west of Yonge. Those predate the boom by decades and sometimes by a century. Galvanized steel supply lines, cast iron drain stacks, clay sewer laterals with mature trees planted over them. Completely different work, completely different conversation.
We do both, and the honest reason we've made a page per community is that a plumber who treats a Vellore Village semi and a Kleinburg farmhouse as the same job is going to get one of them wrong.
The subsidy nobody tells you about
The City of Vaughan runs a protective plumbing subsidy that puts money back in your pocket for installing a backwater valve, and in some cases a sump pump. It's reimbursed after the work is inspected and the paperwork is filed — which is where most homeowners drop it, because the form is dull and the deadline is easy to miss.
We prepare that application as part of the job. It goes with the invoice, not onto your to-do list.
One thing we don't do: private wells and septic systems. No well pumps, pressure tanks, water treatment or septic. Almost all of Vaughan is on municipal water and sewer so this rarely comes up here, but it does at the rural edges toward King City.
Most requested here
What Vaughan calls us about
Across the whole city, four jobs come up more than everything else combined.
Backwater valves
Subsidy-eligible work, and the cheapest insurance there is against a sewer backup in a finished basement.
Drain cleaning
Kitchen lines in the newer builds, root-blocked laterals in the old village cores.
Seized shut-off valves
The builder-grade angle stops from the boom years are all giving up at roughly the same time.
Go deeper
Your part of Vaughan, specifically
Three communities inside Vaughan have plumbing distinct enough to be worth their own page.
Maple
Where we're based. Subdivision stock from the 1990s and 2000s around a much older village core at Keele and Major Mackenzie.
Woodbridge
The Humber floodplain runs through it. Basement water protection is the defining job here.
Thornhill
West of Yonge is Vaughan, east is Markham. Either way it's the oldest housing stock we regularly work on.
Questions
Plumbing in Vaughan
Does Vaughan have a subsidy for backwater valves?
Yes. The City of Vaughan runs a protective plumbing subsidy covering part of the cost of a backwater valve, and in some cases a sump pump. It is reimbursed after the work is inspected and the paperwork filed — which is where most people drop it. We prepare that application as part of the job.
Do I need a permit to replace a sewer line in Vaughan?
Usually yes. Replacing or altering a building drain or sewer connection normally needs a plumbing permit from the City of Vaughan, and a backwater valve does too. We pull it and book the inspection as part of the job. Fixture, faucet and water heater repairs generally do not.
My Vaughan house was built in the 1990s. What should I be watching for?
Three things reach the end of their life around now. The water heater, which rarely passes 15 years. The small chrome shut-off valves under sinks and toilets, which seize shut. And the original sump pump, if you have one, which is well past its expected life.
There's water coming up through my basement floor drain. Is that the City's problem or mine?
It depends where the blockage sits. The pipe from your house to the property line is yours; beyond that it is the City's. We can tell which side the problem is on before anyone digs, and if it turns out to be the City's we will say so.
Who do I call if a water main breaks on my street in Vaughan?
The City of Vaughan, not us. A break in the municipal main under the road is theirs to repair and they have crews on call for it. If you are not sure whether the break is on the street side or your side of the meter, call us and we will help you work it out.
Vaughan's trusted peak, on the phone in one ring
Call for anything urgent, or book online and we'll confirm a window.