An old wall that leans or cracks usually has water trapped behind it. We build concrete walls that drain and hold your slope.
A concrete retaining wall in Malibu, CA holds back the soil on a slope so your yard, driveway or house pad stays where it is. Built right, it also lets the water behind it drain away instead of pushing on it. On most hillside lots here, the start date depends on the city's reviews, so it pays to plan early.
People usually call about a wall when an old one has started to lean or crack, when a slope keeps sliding onto the patio after heavy rain, or when a rebuild has a wall drawn into the plans next to a new foundation. The price moves with the wall's height and length, how deep we have to dig, how easily equipment can reach the spot and whether an old wall has to come out first. The schedule turns mostly on approvals and engineering. Once I've measured the slope and the access, your written scope shows your own figure, line by line.
I ran a sign shop for years before this, where a job was only right if every measurement was right. I started this business in Malibu in 2023. I still come out to measure the slope myself, and our crew builds the wall with me on site.
The state licensing board has a concrete contractor class that covers forming, pouring, placing and finishing concrete work, and a retaining wall is that kind of work. When you compare bids, ask each contractor which licence they hold and whether they carry insurance for your job.
Your scope lists what goes under, behind and into the wall, from the stone and fabric to the steel, so you know exactly what you're paying for before any work begins. Satisfaction guaranteed. To set up a visit, call (424) 388-5404 or use the form below.
Send your address, a few photos of the slope and any engineering geology report you have, and we'll reply within one business day by phone or message. I'll come out for a free estimate with no obligation, measure the wall, and look at the access and any old concrete. Then I'll send a written scope with a price you can compare line by line.
All of Malibu sits in the coastal zone, and work there generally needs a coastal development permit from the California Coastal Commission or the city before anything starts. Unless a project is exempt, it falls under the city's Local Coastal Program. On hillside lots, the city's geotechnical guidelines can ask for retaining walls to go on separate permits from the house, and the city's geotechnical staff then review those wall plans. I won't guess whether your wall is exempt or needs its own permit. Before we price the job, I look into what the city asks for at your address and tell you what I found. Where approvals are needed, we plan the start around them, and we can handle the concrete side of the paperwork or work alongside your architect or engineer. The office that serves your address has the final word on your lot.
Many fire-affected properties here sit on steep slopes or in active landslide areas, where a rebuild requires added stability measures, and a concrete retaining wall is one of them. On jobs here we see tight hillside driveways, cut slopes behind the house and walls that hold up a pool or patio above them. We do the same work in nearby cities like Topanga and Calabasas. We're based in Malibu and take jobs in many of the cities around it, so if you're not sure we cover your address, just ask when you call.
A 3 ft high poured concrete retaining wall in Los Angeles usually costs about $50 to $54 per square foot, with excavation, backfill and reinforcement included. Treat that as a starting point. Walls taller than 3 ft, curved walls, stamped or multi-colored faces and challenging soil all add to it. Your written estimate gives the figure for your wall.
Work can start once the city's approvals are in place, and in Malibu that means planning review first and building review after it. A project only moves to Building Safety plan check after the Planning Division approves it, so set your start date with both steps in mind. The city also suggests talking with a Building Permit Technician before you submit, since the documents they need depend on the scope of work.
Trapped water is the usual cause. Without drainage, the water behind a wall can make it lean, crack, slide or fail. Drainage disappears once the wall is backfilled, so compare how each bid describes it in writing. Once the wall is in, look at the weep holes, the small openings through the face, after rain. If they used to run and now stay dry, something behind the wall may have changed.
The City Geologist reviews geology reports and building or grading plans, visits sites and tells applicants about geologic hazards tied to the project. If you want to know ahead of time, the California Geological Survey lets you find out whether your property is in an earthquake fault zone or a seismic hazard zone. If you already have an engineering geology report, send it with your estimate request so I can read it before I come out.
Ask each builder how the wall they're proposing would be properly designed for your slope, and compare the answers. After several recent earthquakes, one trade group found that segmental walls, built from stacked interlocking blocks, can be more robust than conventional walls when they're properly designed. That finding is national, so weigh it with what your engineer says about your lot.
