09/24/2026
I sat in a class this afternoon and learned a phrase I had never heard before: concrete cancer.
It shows up in pools built or replastered roughly between 2017 and 2021.
Materials were scarce those years. Crews were stacked three jobs deep. Mixes got improvised.
From the deck, everything looks fine. Clear water, clean tile.
Then the plaster starts spidering, rust bleeds through in thin orange lines, and the gunite behind it has already gone soft.
Most homeowners find out on day six of the option period, from a buyer's inspector holding a flashlight.
That is the worst possible moment to learn it.
Now you are negotiating against a repair bid you did not write, for work you cannot schedule before closing.
The good news is that looking costs you an afternoon, not a summer of an empty pool and a buyer who moved on.
If your pool went in during those years, get eyes on it while time is still on your side.
Message me the year your pool was built. I will tell you what I would check first.
The pools that worry me right now are not the old ones.
