How water finds the parkade
4 min read
Roughly one BC strata building in three has a parkade leak somewhere in its minutes. The water is almost never coming from where the drip is.
The parkade is the lowest point in the building, so it is where the building's water goes to be discovered. We read the leak incidents in 2,000+ samples drawn from our pool of BC strata reviews and pulled out every one that ends in the parking levels. About one leak in eleven does. Nearly all of them stay on common property and never touch a unit. What they touch is a car, which is why roughly one parkade leak in thirty ends with a conversation about a windshield, and why the drip tray is the most-installed piece of equipment in the category.
Where the water comes from is the interesting part. Nearly half of parkade leaks are filed under drainage and about a quarter under plumbing, but the minutes tell a more specific story, and it is almost always about the lid. A parkade roof is a concrete slab with a waterproof membrane on it and, in the Lower Mainland, a garden on top of the membrane. Everything that goes wrong up there comes out below. Planters are the classic: the drain in the bottom clogs, or was never connected, and the planter becomes a bathtub sitting on a twenty-year-old membrane. The fix in the minutes is always the same two words, excavate planter, followed by a bigger drain and a smaller planter. Water features are the next act. A courtyard fountain leaks into the stall below it for a season, the fountain is drained "temporarily," and the minutes never mention refilling it. Pools and hot tubs above parkades do the same thing with more chlorine. Irrigation lines, car-wash bays and a surprising number of hose bibs round out the list.
If it holds water and it is above the parkade, it is in the parkade.
Then there are the cracks. A slab cracks, water follows the crack, and on the way through it dissolves a little of the concrete and leaves it on the ceiling as a white crust. Efflorescence is the word councils learn, and a small stalactite over a parking stall is how they learn it. The repair is a polyurethane injection, which is what about one parkade leak in twenty gets, and it works until the next crack. Roughly one parkade leak in twelve is described as recurring, ongoing or back again, which is the honest word for the drip tray.
New buildings are not exempt. About one building in three has a parkade leak on record in every era, including the newest, where the pattern in the minutes is the deficiency letter: the leak is logged, photographed and sent to the developer, because the envelope is under warranty for five years. [1] The interesting reading is what happens in year six.
The money is the part buyers should look for. Where the minutes put a figure on a parkade leak repair, the median is about $6,000, and three in four are under about $20,000. That is the patch. The project is the membrane: parkade and podium membrane work in the minutes has a median cost of about $40,000, and a full podium replacement is the expensive end of a depreciation report, often well into six figures. [2] Where a strata has gone to owners for a parking or membrane levy, the approved median is about $130,000, roughly $1,300 a door, and the ones voted down asked for more.
The parkade is where the building keeps its evidence. Read the minutes for the word "drip," then look up.
How we counted. Based on 2,000+ samples drawn from our pool of BC strata reviews. Figures come from the council and general-meeting minutes in those samples, mostly 2023 to 2026, searched for leak incidents in parking levels and for the causes, repairs and costs described. Every pattern described appears in at least three unrelated buildings; nothing is quoted and no building is identified. Costs are medians of the figures the minutes state, rounded. If you use these figures, a link back to this post is appreciated.
Further reading
What happened in a building, and whether it is normal
StrataReports reads the full document package of one strata or condo building and reports what happened in it. It then compares the whole building with similar buildings nearby, from finances and insurance to repairs, the condition of its components and disputes, and shows what is normal and what is not. Every finding links to its source page.