The porcelain almost never wears out. The parts inside the tank do, on a five year clock. Almost every repair-or-replace call comes down to telling those two apart.
A toilet is two things bolted together, and they age on completely different clocks. InterNACHI’s estimated life expectancy chart for homes puts toilets, bidets and urinals at more than 100 years and the components inside the tank at 5 years, with valves at 20. So the repair-or-replace question is really one question: did the china fail, or did the parts? The china almost never does. That is the first thing we sort out on a toilet call under licence RMP 15304, and it decides whether you are buying a flapper or a fixture.
Which one failed shows up in the symptom, not in the toilet’s age. Most of what sends people shopping for a new toilet is a worn part behind a lid they have never lifted.
| What you are seeing | What it usually is | Repair or replace |
|---|---|---|
| Runs for a few seconds between flushes | Flapper or flush valve seat | Repair |
| Never stops filling | Fill valve or float setting | Repair |
| Water on the floor at the back | Tank bolts or tank-to-bowl gasket | Repair |
| Water at the base after a flush | Floor flange seal | Repair, reset the fixture |
| Rocks when you sit down | Loose or broken flange, soft subfloor | Repair the flange first |
| Weak flush, bowl needs a second pull | Scaled rim holes and siphon jet, or a worn flapper closing early | Repair, then reassess |
| Hairline crack in the tank or bowl | The fixture itself | Replace |
A running toilet is the easiest problem on this page to live with, and the one that wastes the most water. The EPA reports that household leaks can waste 180 gallons per week, that toilets are often the culprit, and that most toilet leaks are due to old or worn-out flappers.
Find it with food coloring. The EPA’s test is a few drops in the tank and ten minutes of leaving it alone; color in the bowl means the flapper is passing water. A second check is the meter: the EPA suggests reading it before and after a two-hour period when nobody uses water, and treating any movement as a leak somewhere in the house. For scale on what a slow one adds up to, the EPA puts the average household’s leaks at more than 9,300 gallons a year, with nine percent of homes leaking 50 gallons or more per day.
None of that is a reason to replace a toilet. It is a reason to replace a rubber part that has a five year life and has outlived it.
Four situations change the recommendation. A crack anywhere in the china is the clearest: vitreous china is not patchable, and the fixture is done. A base that still rocks after the flange has been repaired usually means a subfloor that has been wet for a long time, which is a floor repair with a new toilet set on top of it. A bowl that needs a second flush every time, after the rim holes and the flapper have been dealt with, is a design problem rather than a wear problem, and no part replaces a bowl that was never going to clear. The 2021 International Plumbing Code sets that as the bar a fixture has to meet: Section 401.2 prohibits water closets whose walls are not thoroughly washed at each discharge.
Age is the fourth. The EPA describes older, inefficient toilets using as much as 6 gallons per flush as a major source of wasted water, and notes that toilets are by far the main source of water use in the home, at nearly 30 percent of an average home’s indoor consumption. Swapping one for a WaterSense labeled model cuts the water a family uses for toilets by 20 to 60 percent, which the EPA puts at nearly 13,000 gallons a year.
Hard water is why the parts wear out faster here than the chart suggests. Leander’s own 2024 drinking water quality report lists hardness at 194 ppm, and the U.S. Geological Survey classes anything above 180 mg/L as calcium carbonate as very hard, noting that heated hard water forms scale that reduces the life of equipment and clogs pipes. In a toilet that shows up as scale creeping across the rim holes and stiffening the flapper. A water softener does not fix a toilet, but it is the reason some houses get five years out of a flapper and others get two.
The efficiency decision has already been made for you. Texas Health and Safety Code Section 372.002 says a person may not sell, offer for sale, distribute or import a plumbing fixture into this state unless it meets the state’s water saving standards and is listed by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. For a toilet sold here on or after January 1, 2014, that standard is an average flush volume of no more than 1.28 gallons, single flush or dual. Before that date the Texas limit was 1.6 gallons.
That is stricter than the federal standard of 1.6 gallons per flush, and stricter than Table 604.4 of the 2021 code, which also caps a water closet at 1.6 gallons per flushing cycle. The EPA’s WaterSense label marks toilets at 1.28 gallons or less, 20 percent under the federal number. In practice any new toilet you buy in Texas is already a high-efficiency toilet, so the question is not whether to get one. It is whether the one you have is worth keeping.
Texas law draws the line at who you hire, not at what you touch in your own house. Section 1301.051 of the Occupations Code says a property owner is not required to be licensed to perform plumbing in their own homestead. Section 1301.351 says anyone who advertises or offers to perform plumbing must secure the services of a responsible master plumber, and that an unlicensed person may not engage in plumbing unless a licence holder supervises and controls the work. A responsible master plumber carries at least $300,000 of commercial liability insurance and is responsible for the supervision and management of the work done under the licence.
A swap is also not the drop-in it looks like. The 2021 plumbing code that the City of Leander has adopted requires at least 15 inches from the center of a water closet to any side wall, partition or vanity, and at least 21 inches of clearance in front of it, so a wider or longer bowl does not always fit where the old one sat. The connection at the floor has to be a floor flange or an approved waste connector and gasket, the flange has to be anchored to the structure, the fixture bolted down with corrosion-resistant bolts, and the joint where the base meets the floor sealed. Leander also lists remodels involving plumbing among the activities that require a permit, and says to confirm with a city building inspector before work starts.
Our own rule is shorter than any of that. Nothing that touches a gas line, a gas control valve or a flue, and nothing behind a wall or under a slab, is homeowner work. That is licensed plumbing in Texas and we do it under RMP 15304.
Vaquero Plumbing repairs and replaces toilets across Leander, Liberty Hill and the surrounding area, and our toilet replacement and repair page covers leaks, clogs, flushing mechanisms and full installs. The office is open Monday to Friday 7:30 to 5:30, Saturday 8:00 to 4:30 and Sunday 8:00 to 3:00. If you want someone to tell you honestly whether the fixture is worth keeping, call 512-893-8705.
Put a few drops of food coloring in the tank and leave it alone. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says that if any color shows up in the bowl after 10 minutes, you have a leak. Flush straight after so the dye does not stain the tank. The EPA also suggests reading your water meter before and after a two-hour stretch with no water used anywhere in the house; if the meter moved, something is leaking.
No. Vitreous china cannot be reliably patched, and a crack in a tank or bowl holds water under the weight of everything above it. That is the one symptom on the list where the fixture itself has failed and replacement is the only honest answer. Everything else, including a running tank, a weak flush and a rocking base, is usually parts or a seal.
Ask the city. Leander says a permit is required before starting any construction within the city limits and lists remodels involving plumbing among the activities that need one, while also saying the list is not comprehensive and that you should confirm with a city building inspector before work starts. A straight fixture swap and a remodel are not the same job, so the inspector's answer is the one that counts.
Yes. Vaquero Plumbing covers Liberty Hill, Leander, Cedar Park, Round Rock, Georgetown and Austin. The office is open Monday to Friday 7:30 to 5:30, Saturday 8:00 to 4:30 and Sunday 8:00 to 3:00.
From leaks and clogs to water heaters and repipes, our family-owned crew is ready with same-day service and honest pricing.