Plumber in Apache Sierra, Apache Junction, AZ

Thirty seconds under a bathroom sink tells most of the story, and it is worth doing before you call anybody.

Dull gray flexible pipe stamped PB2110 is polybutylene, which places the house in the 1978–1995 window and makes a repipe a planning question rather than a wait-and-see one. Threaded steel with rust at the fittings is galvanized, which explains pressure that has faded over years and will keep declining. Rigid copper is generally sound, though it is worth knowing whether it runs through the slab. Flexible red, blue or white tubing stamped PEX means somebody has already repiped, which is a genuine plus.

Check more than one spot. Partial repipes are common in mixed-era neighbourhoods, and what is under the kitchen sink is frequently not what is in the bathroom wall — those transitions between materials are often where the next leak starts.

Send us a photo and we will identify it at no charge.

Below grade the same variability applies. A pre-1980 house here is likely on vitrified clay or cast iron; anything from the 1980s onward is probably PVC or ABS.

That distinction matters enormously to your bill. Clay fails at its joints, which shift in caliche soil and admit roots. Cast iron corrodes from the invert up until a camera shows a pipe with no floor left along the bottom. PVC generally looks clean unless there is a belly or physical damage.

If a line has backed up more than once, a camera inspection is a modest cost and it distinguishes four outcomes with wildly different prices: root intrusion through an intact joint, a cracked section, a belly holding standing water, or a collapsed run. We record the footage, you watch the screen with us, and we mark any defect on the surface with paint.