Clean the infill you have, or replace it? How to tell which one your yard needs

Infill drifts. Foot traffic, rain and gravity move it toward the low side of a yard and away from high-traffic paths, so a lawn that started even ends up thin in some spots and piled in others. Redistribution means brushing the existing material back to level depth across the yard, which is included in every Premium Restoration and can be booked alone at $0.35 to $0.65 a square foot. It fixes unevenness. It does not add material or remove what has gone bad.

Infill fails in a few specific ways, and knowing which one is happening tells you a lot about whether redistribution or replacement is the right call. Compaction happens when years of foot traffic and rain press granules together into a denser layer that drains more slowly and holds moisture longer, which is what eventually crusts. Contamination happens when organic material, pollen, leaf litter, pet residue, works its way between the granules faster than it is cleaned out, effectively turning clean infill into a mixed material that behaves differently than what was installed. Washout happens on a slope or near a downspout, where infill migrates downhill over years until the high side runs thin and the low side piles up. Redistribution addresses washout directly, since it is moving material that is still healthy. It does not reverse compaction or contamination, which is why a yard with those problems needs the material replaced rather than reshuffled. A yard can have all three at once, which is common in an older pet zone: compacted near the door where traffic is heaviest, contaminated with residue throughout, and washed thin along one edge, which is usually when a full pet-zone replacement is the more economical call rather than trying to redistribute around problems redistribution cannot fix.

If the infill is simply uneven, if the depth check comes back a little low in a couple of spots rather than empty, and if any odor responds to enzyme treatment rather than persisting through it, redistribution plus treatment is the right, cheaper move. Most yards that get redistributed twice a year, at a Premium Restoration, never need a full infill replacement, because the material is being cared for before it fails rather than after.

Replacement means extracting the old material, in whole or in the affected zone, and installing new infill, sometimes upgrading a pet zone to an odor-control material such as a zeolite-type or coated sand. It is the right call when the existing infill has failed as a material: crusted into a solid layer instead of loose granules, saturated enough that treatment cannot reach through it, or washed out entirely from an area larger than a small patch. New infill installed runs $0.75 to $1.50 a square foot depending on the material.

Part the fibers in a few spots: the pet zone, a main path, and an out-of-the-way corner as a baseline. Loose, pale, granular material that moves when you press it is healthy and just needs redistributing. A crust that holds together, feels greasy, or smells stronger the closer you get is infill that has failed and needs to come out. A ruler check for depth rounds out the picture, since infill that has visibly thinned out is worth topping up; our infill replacement cost page has the full worked numbers.

Bring us the yard and we will check depth and condition before quoting either path, since redistribution alone on infill that has actually failed just delays the real fix. Redistribution is $0.35 to $0.65 a square foot; full replacement, including odor-control infill for a pet zone, is $0.75 to $1.50 a square foot installed. Either is usually done inside a single visit.