Standing about 5 feet below street level in a hole he dug earlier that morning, Seth Cozzens held part of a PVC pipe from the 80s in his hands. Applying just a smidgeon of pressure, the brittle plastic, which was produced with thinner walls than modern PVC pipes, snapped into several sharp pieces.

Near his feet was another pipe, probably 80 years old, totally clogged with debris.

“It’s called orangeburg,” said Cozzens, who is the co-owner of Plumbing Plus in Ralston. “If you’re still on orangeburg, you’re on borrowed time.”

The sewage pipe with the colorful name is impregnated fiber pipe made from layers of ground wood pulp and asbestos fibers compressed and bound by a water resistant glue, then impregnated with coal tar. It was used in the U.S. from the 1860s through the 1970s and served homeowners well for years.

However, if you still have either type of pipe in service, it will soon need to be replaced. Unlike paint, a roof or replacing windows, when pipes carrying black water out of your house back up, it’s always an emergency.

That emergency can turn into a nightmare if a service line needs to be replaced all the way to the city’s connecting sewage pipe. If it requires a backhoe and replacement pavement work, it can become an expensive endeavor for which few are prepared. Luckily, most repairs aren’t going to cost you an arm and a leg, but a collapsed pipe in a hard to reach place can cost many thousands of dollars.

Many Powell homes are of the age that, if not already upgraded, will soon need new pipes. It’s not if, but when, said City of Powell Building Official and Director of Public Works Ben Hubbard.

“If you have it [orangeburg], it is going to fail,” he said while noting the number of permits requested to replace homeowner owned service lines in the past decade has increased. He has also seen his share of collapsed PVC pipes.

Cozzens explained that the relatively thin-walled pipes from the 80s can start to crack and it doesn’t take much pressure from a clog or tree roots for the entire pipe to fail. That’s when a permit is needed and the city needs to send out a crew to locate and mark other utilities that will require special care. Then your plumbing company will bring in the backhoe and start cutting the appropriate path from the house to the city line. None of the work is cheap.

Hubbard encourages those shopping for a new house to inspect service lines prior to making an offer. Sewer pipes aren’t part of most pre-sale home inspections, but “when you’re buying a house, you also need to know the liabilities,” he said.

Cozzens agrees, saying hidden pipes are often forgotten in the home purchasing process. It might sound like a business pushing a profitable service, but his suggestion comes from the heart. He has seen families facing a sudden and devastating financial emergency and it’s hard to witness anyone facing costs that even the most well-prepared homeowner would struggle to cover.

“I do my best to be sympathetic in these situations and understand how much it hurts,” Cozzens said. “But there’s only so much you can do with a sewer auger.”

He has also seen homeowners who thought they were covered by insurance find out the limits to their policies.

In the same way that few buyers think to inspect service lines before making a home purchase, many often gloss over underground utilities when purchasing insurance. That cut-rate company’s policy may be cheaper, but the savings can all be lost if you don’t have the correct coverage.

Gregg McDonald, an agent for Farmers Insurance in Powell, cautions homeowners need to find a policy that covers every part of the house, including hidden infrastructure, instead of looking for a bare bones policy to save a few bucks a month.

“You’ve bought the most expensive thing that you’re going to purchase in your life. And for a fee, insurers will protect it. But not all policies are equal,” he said.

Service lines should be an immediate concern when purchasing insurance, he advised.

“It’s a real and possibly an immediate expense and that’s nothing a new homeowner wants. You’ve come up with your down payment, you’re making the biggest payments you’ve ever made. It’s the biggest investment of your life, and to have that happen: it’s crushing,” he said.

McDonald added it doesn’t matter from whom you buy insurance, the most important thing to do is not be bashful.

“Ask every question that pops into your head, because that’s what you’re paying the agent to do is answer those questions and educate you,” he said.

McDonald also suggests making sure you have coverage for loss of use. For example, if you only have one bathroom and it’s out of order, you’ll need to find a hotel room until the problem is fixed. Those costs can add up as well and it’s better to be safe than sorry.

Finally, after you contact your insurance agent and hire a plumber, Cozzens said if you do need to use the D word (dig), make sure to install a cleanout line, giving the plumber a quick way to get to the problem without needing to go into the house. The faster they can work, the cheaper the job will be, he said.