Option 2 Of 2 · El Dorado County
Full pool removal in El Dorado Hills, CA.
Full removal takes the entire shell out and backfills with engineered material, which is the more straightforward path if anything permanent — a shed, a sport court, an addition — might eventually sit where the pool used to be. On a sloped or granite-close lot, full removal usually means more excavation and more material moving across a yard that wasn’t flat to begin with, so staging matters more here than it would on level ground. El Dorado Hills’ two-year permit window is a genuine advantage if full removal is step one of a longer plan rather than the whole project — it gives the yard time to settle and gives you time to firm up what comes next without the permit lapsing first. What the county will approve for that next phase is still a conversation with the building official, not something we can promise from the removal side.
Plate 02—Full removal/Illustrative
In short
Full removal in El Dorado Hills takes out the entire shell and hauls it off the property before the excavation is backfilled, compacted and finish graded. It is permitted by El Dorado County and is generally the option when a structure may go on the footprint later.
Two-year permit window means the removal doesn’t have to be the last decision you make about that yard.
The Work
What actually happens.
- 1The whole shell comes out. Walls, floor and bond beam. Nothing structural stays.
- 2Material leaves the property. Concrete, rebar, plumbing and equipment hauled off, not buried.
- 3The excavation is backfilled in lifts. Placed and compacted in layers to the depth the job requires.
- 4Finish grade. Shaped so water leaves the area rather than sitting against a structure.
Where the material goes from El Dorado Hills
Concrete, gunite and rebar make up most of what comes out of a pool shell, and CALGreen’s statewide 65% construction and demolition diversion baseline applies here the same as anywhere else in California. El Dorado County is covered by the El Dorado County Air Quality Management District, which is the relevant authority for dust and debris-related air quality questions on a demolition site — a different agency than the districts covering the valley floor. Before any digging starts, California Government Code Section 4216 requires an 811 utility notification, with excavation legal two working days after that notification goes in, regardless of which office issued the demolition permit.
Local Requirements
How El Dorado Hills treats it.
El Dorado County publishes no handout specific to swimming pool demolition, so a full pool removal here is permitted as a demolition and the scope is set by what the building official asks for on your property. That is normal — it just means the site walk carries more weight than a printed checklist would.
We prepare and coordinate the paperwork with El Dorado County. What we cannot do is promise how a department will rule on a specific property, and we will not tell you a permit is guaranteed.
Also applies here
Septic and well setbacks
Unincorporated El Dorado County parcels commonly run on septic and, further out, private wells, both administered by county Environmental Management. That matters for a pool removal in two practical ways: a leach field is not something to drive a loaded truck across, and fill and drainage design has to account for what is already in the ground nearby.
Source: El Dorado County Environmental Management, Environmental Management — septic and well programsVerified August 22, 2026. Permit requirements change — confirm with the department before relying on this for your property.
Permits run two years, and eTRAKiT runs the rest
El Dorado County building permits expire two years from issue and can be renewed, and fee payment, inspection scheduling and project tracking all run through the county's eTRAKiT portal. Useful if a removal is the first step of a longer project rather than the whole of it.
Source: El Dorado County Planning and Building Department, Building DivisionVerified August 22, 2026. Permit requirements change — confirm with the department before relying on this for your property.
Fit Check
Full removal in El Dorado Hills
- Permit authority
- El Dorado County Planning and Building Department, Building Division
- Generally fits
- Any plan that may put a structure on the old footprint — an addition, a shop, an ADU.
- Owners who want nothing left in the ground and nothing to disclose later.
- Ground that will carry load, not just landscaping.
- Think twice if
- Access is genuinely severe — more material moves both directions.
- The yard is only ever going to be lawn or planting, and no structure is planned.
- Budget is the binding constraint and future construction is firmly off the table.
- Ground
- Sierra foothill — El Dorado County
Source: El Dorado County Planning and Building Department, Building DivisionVerified August 22, 2026. Permit requirements change — confirm with the department before relying on this for your property.
Getting In And Out
Access, ground and material movement.
Access in El Dorado Hills
Foothill lots in El Dorado Hills tend to be graded in tiers rather than flat, so the walk from street to backyard is rarely a straight shot. We look at gate widths, retaining walls, and whatever grade change sits between the driveway and the pool before we size equipment, because a mini-excavator that clears one gate can still get stopped by a switchback path or a low arbor further in. Weathered granite close to the surface is common in this part of the county, which can mean a different excavator attachment than a valley-floor job would need. None of that is a problem to solve on-site the day of — it’s a walk-through question, done before a crew or truck ever shows up.
Sierra foothill ground
This is Sierra Nevada foothill ground — shallower soils over weathered granite, and slopes that rarely give you a flat place to stage. Two consequences for a pool removal: rock can change the equipment and the schedule once you are below the shell, and grading has to be designed for a lot that already sheds water somewhere, so the finished surface drains the way the lot always did rather than sending it at a structure. Conditions vary parcel to parcel.
Full removal moves material in both directions — everything out, then fill in — so access has more leverage on a full removal than on a fill-in. It is one of the first things we measure on the site walk.
Keep Reading
Where to go next.
Pool removal in El Dorado Hills
The full local picture — jurisdiction, overlays and the questions people in El Dorado Hills actually ask.
Partial fill-in in El Dorado Hills
The other method, treated the same way. Worth reading both before deciding.
How full pool removal works
The method in full detail, without the local layer.
What it costs
The conditions that move the number on a job like this.
Permits by jurisdiction
Every department we work with, and what each one publishes.
Backfill and compaction
Why the fill step is the one that decides how the ground behaves later.
Get On The Schedule
Get a full removal estimate.
The form is already set to El Dorado Hills and to full removal — change either if we have guessed wrong. Plenty of people research one method and end up choosing the other once they have seen the yard measured.
Get a free site estimate
Tell us a little about your project and we'll be in touch.