Service areas › Manhattan

Plumber in Manhattan

Most plumbing work in Manhattan is inside an apartment, and almost every apartment job is shaped by the building around it before it is shaped by the pipe.

The plumbing here

Most of the plumbing that matters in a Manhattan apartment is shared. Supply and waste risers run floor to floor through the line of apartments stacked above and below yours, so a leak in your ceiling may be your neighbour's drain, and replacing your shower valve may mean shutting the water to the whole line.

Taller buildings fill a rooftop tank and feed the apartments by gravity, so pressure is lowest on the top floors and highest at the bottom. Older shower valves are often built into tiled walls with no access panel, which is what turns a cartridge swap into a tile repair if nobody plans for it.

What we get called out for

• A stain or drip on the ceiling — the first question is whose pipe it is, and that decides who pays.
• Weak pressure that is the same at every fixture — on an upper floor that is often the building, not your plumbing.
• Weak pressure at one fixture only — usually an aerator, a cartridge or a supply line, and usually a small job.
• A shower that runs too hot or too cold, or drips with the handle off.
• A kitchen sink that backs up whenever a neighbour runs the dishwasher.

Before we come out

• Ask your managing agent what the building needs before work starts — paperwork, permitted work hours, and notice to the super. Tell us when you book, and we plan around it.
• If the work means shutting a riser, the super schedules the shutdown and notifies the other apartments. We work to their time, not the other way round.
• For a leak from above, it helps to know who lives upstairs and whether management has already been told. Tracing it usually needs access to both apartments.

Questions from Manhattan

Water is coming through my ceiling. What do I do first?

Tell the super or managing agent straight away — they can reach the apartment above and shut the line if it comes to that. Then call us. We trace where it is coming from, and the answer decides whether it is your repair, the neighbour's, or the building's.

Can you fix low pressure on a top floor?

Sometimes. A clogged cartridge, aerator or valve inside the apartment we can fix. If every fixture is weak because of how the building feeds the top floors, that is a building system, and we will say so rather than sell you a part that will not help.

Do you do commercial work in Manhattan too?

Yes — restaurants, shops and offices, booked as scheduled work. See commercial plumbing for how billing and records work.

Other areas we cover

The Bronx, Queens, Nassau County, Suffolk County, Westchester County and Bergen County. Near the edge of one? Call (914) 429-6900 with the address.