Wings on the window sill are usually the first sign. On warm, still evenings from late spring into early summer, Formosan swarmers come off in clouds around porch lights and street lamps across Chalmette, and by morning you've got a pile of shed wings behind the blinds. Formosan subterranean termites have been established in the New Orleans area since the 1950s and are the most destructive termite we deal with here — the USDA has put the city's control and repair bill at roughly $300 million a year. If you're seeing swarmers indoors, the colony is already in or under the structure, not out at the fence line.
A proper termite inspection is a slow walk, not a glance. The perimeter gets checked for mud tubes running up pier blocks, slab edges, utility penetrations and brick veneer. Inside, the focus is the places water and wood meet: the bath trap behind the tub, under the water heater, door jambs and baseboards on exterior walls, and any addition where an old slab meets a new one. Sill plates and floor joists get sounded with a probe, and suspect areas checked with a moisture meter. Attics matter more here than in most of the country, because Formosans build carton nests in wall voids and roof structures and can sustain a satellite colony with no soil contact at all. Part of the job is also ruling things out — ant swarmers have bent antennae, a pinched waist and uneven wings, and a carpenter ant or fire ant problem is a completely different treatment from a termite job, with different products and a different schedule.
Subterranean termite treatment on a slab-on-grade house means establishing a continuous treated zone in the soil: trenching and rodding the full perimeter, then drilling through concrete where a patio, driveway, porch or carport sits against the foundation so the product goes underneath rather than stopping at the edge. Expansion joints and plumbing penetrations get drilled and injected too. On the raised pier homes common through Arabi and parts of Chalmette, the work is more under-house trenching and treating each pier and chase. Where there's active galleries or a carton nest in a void, that gets foamed or directly treated as well, because soil work alone won't reach a colony living above grade. Bait station systems are the other route — stations set in the soil around the structure and serviced on a cycle — and they suit houses where drilling would be destructive or where the slab is broken up by hardscape. What drives the price is linear footage, slab versus pier construction, how much concrete has to be drilled, access under decks and dense landscaping, and whether there's live activity inside requiring void work on top of the perimeter. Done badly, you get gaps: an untreated bath trap, a skipped stretch behind an air conditioner pad, stations installed and then never checked. Those gaps are exactly where termites come back.
Pre-construction termite treatment is the cheapest termite work you will ever buy. The pad and footing trenches are treated before the slab is poured, plumbing penetrations are treated at the stub-outs, and the backfill is treated as it goes in. Once concrete is down, the same protection costs far more because it has to be drilled in. If you're building or adding on in Meraux or Poydras, schedule that treatment around the concrete pour, not after it.
If you're buying or selling, the termite letter for home sale — the WDI report — is the document the lender and closing attorney want. It records visible evidence of wood-destroying insects in accessible areas, whether activity is live or old, any previous treatment, and conducive conditions like wood-to-ground contact or a leaking hose bib. Book it early in the contract period; finding live activity two days before closing is how closings slip. Buyers should ask whether the evidence noted is historic or current, and who is paying for treatment and repair.
Annual termite monitoring is what keeps all of it worth having. Soil termiticide doesn't last forever, bait stations need servicing, and a yearly inspection catches new tubes before they become joist damage. Before you sign any renewal, ask what it covers: retreatment only, or retreatment and repair, and whether it transfers to a new owner when you sell.
Cypress Perimeter Group works throughout Chalmette, Arabi, Meraux, Poydras, New Orleans and Gentilly, licensed and insured, with licensed contractors on the work. Estimates are free, same-day service is available, and several payment methods are accepted. Enquiries are by phone — Monday to Friday 8am to 6pm, Saturday 8am to 1pm.