Anybody with a circular saw and a truck can call themselves a deck builder. Most of the ones who go wrong don't get caught until the second summer, when the ledger board starts pulling away from the house or the footings heave from the clay under them. By then the person who built it has moved on to the next job. This post is about what to check before you sign anything, not after.

The ledger board is where most decks actually fail

If the deck attaches to the house, the ledger board is the single most important connection on the whole project, and it's also the part most homeowners never look at again once the boards are down. It has to be lag-bolted or through-bolted into the house framing, not just nailed, and it needs flashing behind it so water running off the deck doesn't get channeled straight into your rim joist. A deck that looks fine from the yard can be rotting the house behind it for years before anyone notices a soft spot on the siding. Ask any builder you're considering how they flash a ledger. If they shrug, that's your answer.

Freestanding decks, the kind set on their own posts a few feet off the house, avoid this problem entirely. It's one reason some builders default to freestanding designs on older Collierville homes where the original rim joist is questionable.

Footings, clay soil, and why 12 inches deep isn't automatically enough

Shelby County soil is heavy clay in a lot of places, and clay does two things that matter to a deck: it swells when it's wet and it shrinks when it dries out, sometimes cracking a couple of inches wide by late August. A footing that isn't poured deep enough, or isn't wide enough at the base, will move with that cycle over a few years. You'll feel it as a slight bounce or a rail that's gone slightly out of plumb. Local code generally wants footings below the frost line, which around here is shallower than it would be further north, but frost isn't actually the main threat in this soil. Bearing capacity and drainage around the footing matter more. A builder who's poured footings in this county knows to get below the topsoil into more stable clay and to backfill so water doesn't pond right at the post base.

Ask how deep the footings will go and whether they're using poured concrete piers or something else. "We'll figure that out" is not an answer you want to hear at the estimate stage.

Permits aren't optional, and skipping them costs you at resale

Collierville requires a permit for most new decks, and if it's attached to the house or more than a couple feet off the ground, expect a framing inspection and a final inspection before it's signed off. A lot of Collierville subdivisions also have an HOA that wants to approve the design before you ever get to the town, sometimes over things as small as railing style or stain color, so budget a few extra weeks if you're in one of those neighborhoods. A permitted deck shows up on the county's records. An unpermitted one shows up as a problem during a home inspection when you go to sell, and buyers' agents in this market know to look for it. If a builder tells you permits are a waste of time or that they can "just build it fast before anyone notices," that's a walk-away moment, not a money-saving tip.

Ask about lumber and fasteners before you ask about railing style

Most decks around here still get framed in pressure-treated pine, and that's fine, it's a proven material, but the grade matters. Anything within 6 inches of the ground or in direct soil contact needs to be rated for ground contact, not the standard above-ground treatment. Fasteners have to be rated for treated lumber too, since the chemicals in modern treated wood corrode plain steel screws over a few years. If a crew shows up with a box of untreated deck screws because that's what they had on the truck, stop them.

Composite decking has gotten popular for a reason. It doesn't rot, it doesn't need staining every couple of years, and it holds up fine in Memphis-area humidity. It does expand and contract more than wood does in our summer heat, so the gapping between boards has to be set correctly at install or you'll get buckling by the second July. A builder who's installed a lot of composite will know the manufacturer's gap spec off the top of their head. One who hasn't will guess.

Termites are a real consideration in this part of Tennessee, subterranean termites specifically. Any wood touching soil, or close to it, is a food source. Good clearance between the ground and the framing, and using ground-contact rated lumber where it's needed, is not optional here the way it might be in a drier climate.

What the good ones do differently

  • They pull the permit themselves and schedule the inspections, they don't leave that paperwork to you.
  • They can tell you, without checking a chart, the joist spacing they'll use for composite versus wood decking, because it's different.
  • They ask about drainage on your lot before they talk about design. On flat Collierville lots, water needs somewhere to go, and a deck built without thinking about grading can turn one corner of the yard into a standing puddle after a hard spring rain.
  • They give you a written estimate that breaks out framing, decking material, railing, and labor separately, not one lump number.
  • They're licensed and insured, and they'll show you proof without you having to ask twice.

Signs to walk away from

A price that's dramatically lower than every other quote usually means something's getting skipped, and it's rarely something you'll notice until year two or three. Be wary of anyone who wants a large deposit in cash before any work starts, or who can't tell you which subcontractor pours their footings if they don't pour concrete themselves. If a builder can't answer a direct question about frost depth, ledger flashing, or fastener type, they haven't built enough decks to be trusted with yours.

Older homes in neighborhoods like the areas around the historic Town Square tend to have older framing and sometimes surprises once a wall gets opened up. Newer subdivisions built in the last twenty or so years usually have more consistent framing but tighter setback requirements from the property line, since lots tend to be smaller. Either way, a builder who's worked around here recently will know what to expect before the crew shows up, not after.

A deck is one of the few home projects that sits outside in the weather every single day, through humid Tennessee summers and the freeze-thaw swings of January and February, so the parts nobody sees, the footings, the ledger flashing, the fasteners, matter more than the parts everybody photographs. That's most of what Absolute Deck Solutions gets called out for eventually, either to build it right the first time or to fix what someone else rushed.