Hear from Our Customers
From late April through October, Fitzgerald sits in some of the most consistent pool weather in the country. We’re talking 90-degree afternoons, heat indices pushing past 100 in July and August, and a swim season that stretches close to 210 days. A pool in Fitzgerald isn’t a luxury item you use a few weekends a year it’s a backyard you actually live in for more than half of it.
But here’s what most people don’t think about until after the build: South Georgia’s clay soil expands when it’s wet and contracts when it dries out. That cycle puts real stress on a pool shell if the builder didn’t account for it. The cracking stories you’ve probably heard aren’t a gunite problem they’re a builder problem. A properly engineered shell, with the right rebar density and wall thickness for this specific soil type, doesn’t move. That’s the difference between a 30-year pool and a 10-year headache.
When the build is done right, what you get is straightforward: a pool that holds its shape, holds its finish, and doesn’t surprise you with structural issues five years down the road. You also get a backyard that works for your family from the Wild Chicken Festival in March all the way through the last warm weekend of fall.
We’re based in Douglas, GA about 40 miles from Fitzgerald in neighboring Coffee County. We’ve been building custom inground gunite pools since 2014, and our team brought more than 30 years of hands-on experience in concrete, plumbing, and pool construction before we ever opened our doors.
What makes us different isn’t a tagline. It’s a policy. We don’t subcontract. Excavation, rebar, gunite application, plumbing, electrical, finishing, decking our own crew handles every phase. That means one company is accountable from the first shovel to the final inspection, and the same people who built your pool are the ones you call if something ever needs attention.
We know Fitzgerald’s permitting process both the City of Fitzgerald Building Department and the county-level requirements at Ben Hill County Building and Zoning on East Central Avenue. We pull every permit, schedule every inspection, and manage the whole process in-house. You don’t chase paperwork. That’s our job.
It starts with a design conversation not a sales pitch. We want to understand your yard, your family, and what you actually want out of the space. From there, we build a 3D rendering of your pool so you can see exactly what it’s going to look like before anything gets touched. No surprises at the end because there are no surprises in the design.
Once the design is approved, we handle the permit applications City of Fitzgerald Building Department and Ben Hill County Building and Zoning, along with the electrical permit and any required zoning approvals through Fitzgerald Utilities. This step takes time, and we manage it entirely. You’ll know where things stand, but you won’t be doing the legwork.
Construction typically runs three to six months from permit approval to finished pool. Excavation comes first, then the steel framework, then the gunite shell applied and cured specifically for South Georgia clay conditions. Plumbing and electrical follow, then equipment installation, surface finishing, and decking. Every phase is our crew. When we hand you the keys, the pool has passed every required inspection and is ready to use. The smart move for most Fitzgerald homeowners is to start the process in fall permit queues are shorter, crews have more availability, and your pool is ready when the heat hits in April.
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A custom gunite pool from us is built from the ground up literally. That means full excavation, engineered rebar framework, gunite shell application, all plumbing, NEC Article 680-compliant electrical bonding and grounding, equipment installation, surface finishing, and deck construction. Everything is in-house. No phase gets handed off to a crew you’ve never met.
For Fitzgerald homeowners specifically, the structural engineering matters more than most builders will tell you. Ben Hill County’s clay soil and the heavy summer storm activity that comes through South Georgia every year create real drainage and settling challenges if the pool isn’t built with that in mind. We engineer for those conditions on every build it’s not an add-on, it’s just how we work.
On the equipment side, we install and service Hayward, Pentair, Jandy, Sta-Rite, and Zodiac systems. That matters because we’re not just a construction company we can maintain what we build. In a community the size of Fitzgerald, having a builder who’s still reachable five years after the project closes is worth more than most people realize until they need it. The realistic investment range for a quality custom gunite pool in Georgia runs $75,000 to $150,000 depending on size, features, and site conditions. We’ll give you a clear picture of what your specific project looks like before you commit to anything.
This is the most common concern we hear from Ben Hill County homeowners, and it’s a fair one especially because at least one local competitor has built their entire marketing around the claim that Southern soil will crack a gunite shell. Here’s the honest answer: poorly built gunite pools do crack in clay soil. Properly engineered ones don’t.
South Georgia clay expands when it absorbs moisture and contracts during dry spells. That movement is real, and it does put stress on a pool shell. The solution isn’t to avoid gunite it’s to build the shell with the right rebar density, adequate wall thickness, and structural design that accounts for soil movement specific to this region. That’s not optional on our builds. It’s how every pool we construct is engineered. Cracking is a builder problem, not a material problem, and the way you avoid it is by hiring someone who understands what they’re building into.
The honest range for a quality custom gunite pool in Georgia is $75,000 to $150,000. Where your project lands within that range depends on the size of the pool, the depth, the features you want waterfalls, sun shelves, attached spas the deck design, and the specific conditions of your yard in Ben Hill County.
What we won’t do is give you a low number to get you started and then add to it as the project moves forward. Before you commit to anything, we’ll walk through a clear breakdown of what your specific build looks like and what it costs. The median home value in Fitzgerald is around $97,000, so we understand this is a major investment relative to what most homes in the area are worth. That’s exactly why we think transparency upfront matters more here than it might in a higher-priced market.
Pool construction in Fitzgerald involves two separate permitting layers the City of Fitzgerald Building Department and Ben Hill County Building and Zoning, located at 212 East Central Avenue. The permit package typically includes a building permit application, plat or legal description, house plans with elevation, mechanical and plumbing documentation, electrical permit for the pool equipment and bonding system, and zoning approval through Fitzgerald Utilities.
It’s a multi-step process, and a builder who hasn’t worked in Ben Hill County before will spend time figuring it out at your expense. We’ve done this enough times in South Georgia to know exactly what each office needs and when. We handle the entire permit process in-house applications, follow-ups, inspection scheduling, everything. You don’t fill out a single form or make a single call to a permit office. That’s part of the build, not an extra service.
From the time permits are approved, most custom gunite pool builds run three to six months through completion. The full timeline from your first design conversation to your first swim including the permit process typically runs five to seven months depending on permit queue times, weather, and project complexity.
The smartest thing a Fitzgerald homeowner can do is start the process in fall. Permit offices are less backed up, construction crews have more scheduling availability, and a pool started in October or November is ready to use when South Georgia heats up in April. If you wait until March or April to start which is when most people think about it you’re looking at a late summer or fall completion at best. We’ll always give you an honest timeline at the start of the design process so you know exactly what to plan around.
Both can work, but they’re not the same product and they’re not right for every situation. Fiberglass pools come in preset shapes and sizes what you see in the catalog is what you get. If a standard shape works for your yard and your priorities, fiberglass can be a reasonable option. But if you want a specific shape, a custom depth, a sun shelf positioned exactly where the afternoon light hits, or a design that fits an unusual yard layout, gunite is the only material that gives you that freedom.
The other factor specific to Fitzgerald is the long-term cost picture. A quality gunite pool needs resurfacing every 10 to 15 years. A vinyl liner the main alternative in this price range needs replacement every five to nine years at roughly $4,000 to $4,500 per cycle. Over 30 years of South Georgia swimming seasons, the numbers are closer than most people expect. What gunite gives you that nothing else does is a permanent, fully custom shell built specifically for your backyard.
Yes and in a community the size of Fitzgerald, that matters more than it might somewhere else. In a town of around 9,000 people, the reputation you build stays with you. We’re not interested in building a pool in Ben Hill County and being unreachable six months later. We service every major equipment brand we install Hayward, Pentair, Jandy, Sta-Rite, and Zodiac so the company that designed your pool, pulled your permits, and built your shell is the same company you call when something needs attention down the road.
That’s not a common setup in this industry. Most builders hand off construction to subcontractors and move on. Because our team handles every phase of the build, we actually know your pool the equipment, the plumbing layout, the electrical system. When you call us after the build, we’re not starting from scratch trying to figure out what someone else did. We know it because we built it.
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