Butler County, KS Shrink-Swell Risk

What Butler County, KS's soil means for a foundation

High

USDA's SSURGO data puts Butler County, KS's soil at "High" shrink-swell potential, an area-weighted linear extensibility of 6.27% across 64.7% of the county's surveyed land. Ground like this needs active moisture control to keep a conventional foundation from cracking - it's not automatic either way.

This is a county figure, not a lot figure

USDA's survey covers the whole of Butler County, KS at once, not any single address. A site-specific soil report, usually $1,000-$5,000, is what an engineer would actually pull before designing a foundation on a lot in Butler County.

Report cost vs. repair cost

Butler County's soil reading is exactly the case where a report before construction, or before cracks widen, pays for itself. The report ($1,000-$5,000) is what tells you whether Butler County's county-level reading applies to your lot; the repair ($5,000-$15,000) is what it costs if you skip that and find out from the cracks instead.

Butler County's rank among Kansas counties

Nationally, Butler County, KS is the 102-most-constrained of 3,085 rated counties for shrink-swell soil. Within Kansas alone it ranks 2 of 105. The county spans 1,430 square miles, home to 69,158 people.

Before you act on this

Orleans Parish, LA carries this site's most-constrained reading. Simpson County, MS and Buckingham County, VA are worth a look for comparison.

How this reading is built, and its real limits · The warning signs of expansive-clay damage, explained

More of Kansas

Every county in Kansas is on this site, including Reno County, KS and Allen County, KS. The full underlying dataset is downloadable directly, one row per county.