Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Renovating a Pond or Lake? Can I seal or fill in a pond?

I am looking at buying a 1.1 acre land in MN. About ~.7 of the land is Pond. Soil Type is Loam I believe. However, the area to build the house on is not very big, so I am considering filling in part of the pond to make for a bigger land. However, I am not sure what type of headaches will this cause or if it is even possible. Any feedback would be great.

Welcome to the forum. I don't see that as a problem if you fill in the whole thing, and compact the fill to the same compaction as the virgin soil.

If you don't compact it properly, then you'll have foundation/slab cracking.

My two cents is that you would need to let any fill settle for a few years before building or put piles down to virgin soil - Then there is the issue of where the water for the pond is coming from and how to keep it out from under the house. I would be very careful.

Just make sure your footing is at least two foot deep into undisturbed soil. You may end up with a tall basement. Then you could grade the lot several times, let it settle till you get the desired elevation and then grass it. You should probably get an engineer to sign off on your plan. Good luck.

You could always work with what you have... example: Porch/deck out over the water.

Less to mow is always a good thing in my book! Unless you have kids that need room to kick a ball around.