Hear from Our Customers
When a pool is engineered for where you actually live not just dropped in and hoped for the best the difference shows up fast. You stop worrying about whether the shell will shift after a wet season. You stop wondering if the contractor accounted for the kind of ground that sits along the Ocmulgee River corridor, where the water table rises, the soil moves, and the clay underneath doesn’t forgive shortcuts.
Lumber City’s July heat index averages around 109°F. That’s not a statistic you need to be told you’ve lived it. A pool here isn’t a weekend luxury. It’s something your family uses from March through November, and it needs to hold up through that entire season, year after year, without becoming an expensive problem.
Concrete pools built with the right structural reinforcement and drainage design don’t just survive South Georgia’s conditions they thrive in them. The investment you make now delivers real, usable value across a swim season that most of the country can’t touch. And when it’s done right the first time, you’re not calling anyone back to fix what should have been handled before the first shovel hit the ground.
We founded Deep Waters Pools in Douglas, GA in 2014 but the experience behind it goes back more than 30 years before that. Our founder spent those decades doing hands-on work in concrete, plumbing, and pool construction across South Georgia, which means the soil conditions, the drainage challenges, and the weather realities specific to Telfair County and Lumber City aren’t new territory. They’re the reason this company exists.
We built Deep Waters specifically because too many South Georgia families were getting burned by contractors who made big promises and delivered something far worse. That’s not a tagline it’s the actual reason the doors opened. Licensed, insured, and family-owned, we run on a referral-based model, which means every job in the Lumber City region has to be done right. A bad job in a small community like Lumber City doesn’t stay quiet.
From Douglas, it’s a straight shot up US 23/341 through Hazlehurst and into Telfair County. That’s not a stretch that’s a neighbor.
It starts with a conversation about your yard, your goals, and your budget. Before anything else, we assess the site including drainage, soil conditions, and proximity to any low-lying areas near the Ocmulgee River corridor that could affect how the pool is engineered. Lumber City’s hydrology isn’t something you can ignore at the design stage. The town earned the nickname “Artesian City” for a reason, and that underground water pressure is a real variable in any below-grade construction project here.
Once the design is finalized, we handle the permit process through Telfair County’s building department from start to finish. You don’t chase paperwork or figure out who to call that’s handled. Georgia requires multiple inspection stages for inground pool construction, and navigating a rural county building department takes experience. That’s not a problem here.
From permit approval to a finished, operational pool, our build timeline runs 8 to 12 weeks. That’s a real number, stated upfront not a vague estimate that stretches across your entire summer. When the job is done, you get a complete walkthrough of your pool’s systems: how the pump works, how to manage water chemistry, and what to watch for. You leave that conversation knowing how to take care of what we just built.
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We specialize in custom inground concrete pool construction not fiberglass, not vinyl liner. That’s a deliberate focus, and it matters for Lumber City homeowners specifically. Concrete pools aren’t limited to pre-molded shapes or standard sizes. Your yard, your design, your call. And in a community where a pool represents a significant investment relative to local home values, the structural permanence of concrete a pool that can last 30 years or more is the kind of value that actually holds up over time.
Beyond new construction, we also handle pool renovation work for homeowners who already have a pool that needs updating, resurfacing, or structural repair. Given the age of much of Lumber City’s housing stock, this is a real service need in the area not everyone is starting from scratch, and an older pool that’s been sitting unused or underperforming can often be brought back to full function at a fraction of replacement cost.
Every project includes a custom safety cover and barrier installation that meets Georgia’s pool safety code requirements not as an add-on, but as a standard part of the job. Full system training is included at project completion. And because we serve the South Georgia region directly, you’re not dealing with a distant company that dispatches a subcontractor and hopes for the best.
There’s no pool company with a storefront or local address in Lumber City that’s just the reality of a small town in Telfair County. But we serve the surrounding South Georgia region including Lumber City and the broader Telfair County area. Douglas is roughly 30 miles away via US 23/341 through Hazlehurst, which is a familiar drive for anyone in Lumber City who travels that corridor for regional services, medical care, or shopping.
The distance isn’t a barrier it’s a route we know well. We’ve been building across South Georgia for over a decade, and our founder’s 30-plus years of hands-on experience in this specific region means Lumber City’s soil conditions, weather patterns, and construction environment aren’t unfamiliar. If you’ve been hesitant to reach out because you assumed no one would come out this far, that assumption is worth reconsidering.
Custom concrete pools in South Georgia typically run between $60,000 and $100,000 or more, depending on size, design complexity, site conditions, and what’s included in the build. That’s a wide range because no two projects are identical a straightforward rectangular pool on a flat lot with easy access is a different job than a custom-shaped pool on a site that requires drainage engineering near a high water table.
For Lumber City homeowners, the site assessment matters a lot. Properties near the Ocmulgee River or in lower-elevation areas of Telfair County may have drainage and soil considerations that affect the engineering requirements and by extension, the cost. Getting a quote without a proper site evaluation isn’t a real quote. We provide honest, itemized pricing before any commitment is made, so you know exactly what you’re getting into before a shovel hits the ground.
Concrete is the strongest structural option for South Georgia’s Coastal Plain soil conditions. The mix of sandy loam and clay-heavy ground that characterizes the Telfair County area can shift over time, especially in areas with higher moisture content near the Ocmulgee River. Fiberglass shells are pre-molded and can be affected by soil movement and hydrostatic pressure in ways that a properly reinforced concrete shell handles far better over the long term.
Vinyl liner pools require liner replacement every 8 to 12 years, which adds ongoing cost and maintenance complexity. Concrete pools, when built with the right structural reinforcement and drainage design from the start, can last 30 years or more with proper care. In a region that sees 7 hurricanes and multiple flood events among its declared natural disasters, the structural integrity of your pool isn’t a minor consideration it’s the whole ballgame.
Yes, a building permit is required for any inground pool construction in Telfair County. Georgia follows the International Swimming Pool and Spa Code with state-specific amendments, and local permits require a site plan that shows property lines, the pool’s location, and barrier or fencing details that meet Georgia’s pool safety requirements. Multiple inspections are required at different stages of the build structural, plumbing, and final completion.
In a rural county like Telfair, permit processing timelines can vary from what you’d experience in a larger metro county. The building department operates on a smaller staff, and having a contractor who knows the process and submits complete, correct documentation the first time makes a real difference in how fast your project moves. We handle the entire permit process application, coordination, and inspections so you’re not left figuring out the county’s process on your own.
From permit approval to a finished, operational pool, we work on an 8-to-12-week build timeline. That’s the real number, not a hedge. In South Georgia, where the swim season starts as early as March and the heat is genuinely oppressive by May, the timing of when you start the process matters. If you want to be swimming before summer arrives in full force, the conversation needs to happen in late winter January or February at the latest.
Weather and site conditions can affect construction timing, particularly during Telfair County’s wet season or if a tropical system moves through the region. We account for this in the project schedule rather than treating weather delays as an excuse after the fact. The goal is always to deliver a finished pool within the committed window, and the 8-to-12-week range is built with South Georgia’s construction environment in mind not copied from a timeline designed for somewhere else.
A lot of homes in Lumber City and the surrounding Telfair County area were built decades ago, and some of those properties have older pools that have been sitting unused, showing surface wear, or dealing with equipment that’s well past its service life. Pool renovation doesn’t always mean starting over. Depending on what the pool needs, the work might involve resurfacing the interior finish, replacing aging equipment like pumps or heaters, repairing structural cracks, or updating the decking and surrounding area.
We evaluate each renovation project individually what the pool actually needs versus what it doesn’t. If a pool can be brought back to full function at a fraction of replacement cost, that’s the honest answer you’ll get. If the structure has deteriorated to the point where renovation doesn’t make financial sense, that’s the honest answer too. For Lumber City homeowners who’ve inherited an older pool with a property purchase or have one that’s been out of service for years, it’s worth getting a real assessment before writing it off entirely.
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