Retaining walls are used primarily for commercial and industrial applications like holding back large land masses for various building and landscaping designs. Homeowners also frequently utilize retaining walls for more subtle ends, including aesthetic landscaping and preventing soil erosion. Outsiders may have a vision of Dallas as a flat, arid plain, but as a Dallas homeowner you know there are quite a few areas with rolling hills. In fact, if you're interested in a retaining wall, there's a good chance your property is land very much like this.

As beautiful as a hilly, wooded countryside can be, the notoriously unstable soil of north Texas can create all kinds of problems for homeowners and their land. In this sense, a retaining wall can help solidify a section of your property, and look good doing it. There's no one right way to design or build a retaining wall, but it's good to consider some of the possibilities.

Dallas Retaining Walls, Landscaping, and Design
So, what are the ways you can use a retaining wall to your advantage? By digging into the slope of your property and using a retaining wall, you can create a beautiful background for a garden, patio, or you can even install a waterfall with your retaining wall. It might be easy to imagine a semi-circular design in which you install a pond with fish and water lilies. For less ambitious projects, even a basic retaining wall will create a visually appealing effect for your yard, while affording you a level grade in your yard to work with in the future.

Dallas Retaining Wall Installation
As much as there's no one right way to install a retaining wall in Dallas, there are a number of definite wrong ways. Besides the fact that you can't expect to throw a bunch of stones together and come away with a quality retaining wall installation, poorly designed or placed walls can create even bigger problems. You're basically building a miniature dam on your property and, innocent as it may look, without professional expertise, your retaining wall can have all kinds of unexpected effects.

Consequently, any sizable retaining wall will require a building permit. While it seems like a headache at the time, having the local magistrate order you to pay your neighbor several thousands of dollars and/or tear your wall down because it's diverting excess water onto his property is going to create a headache of an entirely different caliber. You'll need to check with your local building codes, but many places stipulate that any wall of four feet or higher requires a building permit. If you simply can't stomach the process of getting a building permit, you may be able to circumvent this problem by building multiple, staggered walls of lesser height.

Cost of Dallas Retaining Wall Installation
The cost of any type of home improvement will vary from project to project, and never is this truer than with retaining walls. Retaining walls experience the trifecta of cost factors: size, design, and materials. And this doesn't even consider the natural fluctuations between different contractors and their labor costs. Size and design are easy enough to understand. A small, straight wall isn't anywhere near as difficult as a long, tall wall that curves or turns. But retaining walls made from brick and mortar, traditional stone masonry, poured concrete, or dry stones may also have different costs. Still, ServiceMagic gathers information on retaining walls in Dallas, and across the country. We can tell you the national average for a retaining wall installation is right around $5,000, but it's not uncommon to see projects as little as $1,000 or more than $10,000. Likewise, construction times can range from a few days to a few weeks, depending on size and building method.