Exterior concrete foundation bricks.

Questions & AnswersCategory: Painting Brick, Stucco and MasonryExterior concrete foundation bricks.
Wendy asked 10 years ago

I live in a house that was built in the late 60’s (as inexpensively as possible!) and it has concrete bricks as its foundation (full sub-ground basement). Back in its day, the exterior of the brick was ‘painted’ with some sort of black sealer that almost appears to have a rubber/plastic type texture to it.

Over the years, some of the sealer has peeled and looked crappy. So a couple of years ago, I pressure washed it and scrubbed it with a wire brush and painted with an exterior concrete paint. Looked great for a couple of months then it started to peel in places. And worst of all, it seemed like perhaps the paint may have sealed in some moisture, as in a couple of places, the brick actually “chunked out”, meaning like a 4″ circle of concrete kind of crumbled away (in a few different places).

I need to do something, as it looks terrible, but I don’t want to waste time and effort doing it wrong again. Any suggestions??

1 Answers
Crowder Painting answered.

The black sealer is a liquid asphalt sealer. Nothing will stick to for very long. You could simply get more sealer and reapply a fresh coat. Most likely the "chunked out" areas was caused by ice, freezing water, that got in or under the sealer. These areas can be patched with a concrete patching compound before resealing.

I would get some more asphalt sealer. This is cheaper and faster. Also you should dig around the foundation to seal below the soil line as best as you can.