2 of the companies say that I can leave my exsisting wall up (finished side of basement) and install the french drain, the other wants me to cut out about a foot of drywall and remove my bottom plate on my wall.

my question is, can i get away with not removing the drywall and bottom plate or should i remove it? Either way it is going to get done, but i wanted to see if any of you have been through this.

If you have a continuing basement water problem, the solution is to stop the water before it breaches your walls. That means a membrane and exterior weepers. And even then you'll face the same problem if your whole neighbourhood is under standing water. And it's way too late to waterproof under the basement slab. So you won't stop water from a rising water table. Sometimes Mother Nature doesn't take "No!" for an answer.

Still sold on interior weepers--and those salesmen are convincing, I know--I don't see that it makes much difference where they put in their weepers. As long as there's lots of gravel under the concrete to channel the water to the weepers. Some builders pour the concrete floor slab right on the native soil. You'll find out when they start breaking it up.

Flooding in Staten Island, N.Y.C. from Hurricane Irene

--correcting outside grading so the water flows away from the structure.

-- installing or repairing downspouts and eavestrough.

--taking downspout water away from the foundation area using long underground drains a few inches under the soil.

Plastic bubble membranes, invented in Europe by Cosella, work two ways.
They keep water from reaching the foundation; and if it does, they allow it
to flow freely down the wall to the weepers.

Finally, you can bring your home or other structure up to current standards and above. This involves excavating around the perimeter of the building down to the footings. At that point, the building can then be covered in peel and stick waterproofing, spray-on materials and/or wrapped in a plastic bubble membrane. Weepers are usually recommended, followed by a couple feet of free draining gravel, sometimes followed by more free draining material, fabric and a clay cap.

Peel and stick waterproofing materials are sometimes used
in conjunction with plastic bubble membranes

These are the most common approaches. But there are others too, including insulation, penetrating sealers on the inside, or the old reliable layers of saturated cloth and fibrated asphalt.

Spray-on waterproofing can bridge small cracks and is best used with membrane wraps

All these approaches involve other details as well. The best time to consider waterproofing is before construction starts, as none of the above retrofits address the basement floor or underside of the slab.

How badly?

How many times are you anticipating a hurricane?

Virginia is not the Gulf Coast or Florida.

I live in New Jersey.