A faucet that drips, drools at the base, or won’t shut off all the way is worth fixing before it wastes water or rots the cabinet below. Send a few details and you’ll get a straight answer from one vetted, licensed San Francisco plumber — not five companies fighting over your phone number.
Tell us the faucet — kitchen, bath, tub, or an old two-handle in a pre-war flat — and what it’s doing, and you’ll get a sharper read on whether it’s a cartridge, a washer, or a fixture worth replacing.
Faucets in San Francisco homes fail in a couple of predictable ways. The city’s Hetch Hetchy water is very soft, so you rarely see the chalky mineral scale that seizes cartridges in hard-water towns — here it’s more often a worn rubber washer or seat, a tired cartridge, or a corroded angle stop under the sink. And in the older flats and Victorians that make up so much of the housing stock, the faucet itself may be a vintage or imported two-handle unit where the failing part is the whole point of the repair. A licensed plumber’s job is to tell you which it is before parts get ordered.
What’s actually dripping
A drip from the spout usually means a worn cartridge, washer, or valve seat — the part that shuts the water off has given up. A leak from the base of the handle points to worn O-rings, and water pooling under the sink is often the supply line or the angle stop, not the faucet at all. Sorting out which one saves you from replacing a good fixture over a fifty-cent part. On older San Francisco faucets the catch is parts availability: a common modern cartridge is a quick swap, but a discontinued or imported unit may need a rebuild kit tracked down — or an honest conversation about replacing it.
Repair or replace, honestly
A quality faucet with a broken cartridge is worth repairing. A bargain fixture that’s corroded through, or a vintage unit whose parts no longer exist, is usually cheaper to replace than to keep chasing. The other thing worth checking while a plumber is under there is the shutoff valves — the little angle stops that let you isolate the faucet. In older homes those are frequently seized or weeping, and it’s far better to replace a bad one during the repair than to discover it doesn’t close during the next emergency. In a drought-conscious city, a fixed drip is also water and money that stops going down the drain.
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San Francisco faucet repair questions
Why does my faucet drip even though our water is soft?
Soft water spares you the mineral scale that seizes faucets elsewhere, but the rubber and plastic parts still wear out. A dripping spout is almost always a worn washer, seat, or cartridge — the shutoff part inside the faucet — not a mineral problem. It’s a common, straightforward repair.
Can you get parts for an old or imported faucet?
Often yes — many older faucets take standard rebuild kits or still-available cartridges. The exceptions are discontinued or unusual imported units common in San Francisco’s vintage flats, where the part may no longer exist. In that case a plumber will tell you honestly whether a rebuild is realistic or replacement makes more sense.
Water is pooling under my sink — is that the faucet?
Not always. Water under the sink is frequently a corroded angle stop or supply line rather than the faucet itself — both common in older homes. A plumber isolates the source so you fix the right thing, and usually swaps a failing shutoff valve at the same time so it actually closes next time you need it.
Send your San Francisco faucet details
Tell us which faucet and what it’s doing — and you’ll get an honest read on whether it’s a quick cartridge job or a fixture worth replacing, with no pressure to book.
No cost, no obligation — just a clear answer from the one vetted, licensed San Francisco plumber who’d actually do the work.