5 Ways To Avoid Water Damage to Your Home

From floods to broken pipes, there is a multitude of ways that unwanted water can work its way into your home. Fortunately, water damage experts suggest several measures you can take to avoid water damage to your home. Here are five ways to lessen the likelihood of water damage to your home.

Keep Your Gutters in Good Shape

It’s your gutters’ job to divert water away from your home to someplace far, far away, such as the edge of your property or Siberia. If they’re blocked, or if their downspouts are disconnected, it’s extremely difficult for them to carry out this task. What’s more, standing water on your roof enabled by a blocked gutter can lead to costly roof damage. Every six months, inspect and clean your gutters and downspouts.

Take Care of Your Trees

Trees may be a lovely thing to see when you gaze out your kitchen window, washing dishes and dreaming of a robot butler, but they can also wreak havoc on your plumbing. When tree roots grow through or around a pipe, that usually spells disaster for the said pipe. For this reason, it’s wise to keep trees and bushes away from your drainage tiles, pipes, and other underground utility components to avoid water damage.

Additionally, it’s important to keep your trees’ limbs trimmed. Doing so can prevent dead limbs from falling on your roof and obstructing those gutters you diligently clean two times a year.

Maintain Your Appliances

Dishwashers, washing machines, and other appliances undoubtedly make our lives easier. They also present a variety of novel ways for water damage to occur. To prevent a potentially soggy malfunction, it’s imperative to inspect your appliances regularly and perform necessary maintenance.

Not only can this extend the length of your appliances’ lives, thereby ensuring that you get the most out of your investment, but it can also prevent your washing machine from turning your laundry room into a live recreation of Lake Michigan.

According to water damage experts, washing machine hoses are among residential floods’ most notorious culprits. It’s important to replace these repeat offenders when they become old and brittle as part of your regularly scheduled maintenance to avoid water damage.

Handle Repairs Promptly

Just like Major League Soccer or the repetitive demands of your toddler, water damage can be easy to ignore at times. When the water has breached your baseboards or drywall, for example, it’s tempting to clean up the water you can see and move on. That’s a bad idea for several reasons, but two of the most glaring are these:

• Ignoring water damage can lead to mold growth, mildew, and rot. In addition to being unhygienic, this can cause structural damage to your home. One of the few things worse than water damage, if you’re a homeowner, is structural damage.
• It’s highly unlikely that your insurance will cover any damage that results from your inattention. Most policies cover water damage caused by circumstances beyond your control, such as a massive rainstorm. Most policies do not cover water damage caused by situations you could’ve prevented through maintenance.

Some household repairs can wait, such as those that are largely cosmetic in nature. Others, particularly those involving water, cannot.

Keep Your Ears and Eyes Open

Right about now, you may be saying to yourself. “Okay, fine. But how do you know if your pipes are leaky or otherwise need maintenance? They’re behind the walls, for Pete’s sake.” That’s a fair point. There are, however, clues that something has gone awry with your plumbing. Two of the biggest and easiest to detect are weird sounds and your water bill.

If you have noisy pipes, it may suggest a leak or an issue with the straps that hold your pipes in place. Ignoring unusual sounds may ultimately result in a burst pipe and expensive repairs. If it sounds like there’s a Megadeth concert in your plumbing every night, it’s likely time to consult with a professional to determine the source of all that banging, humming, or vibrating.

Another clue can be your water bill. If you notice that your water usage suddenly skyrockets, that may suggest that you’ve sprung a leak somewhere. Don’t shrug it off. Call a plumber before you have to add costly repairs to your budget alongside your ballooning utility bills.

While these tips can go a long way toward minimizing the chance of water invading your home, some water events are simply unavoidable. When you need to restore your home quickly, thoroughly, and safely, entrust that job to the water damage experts at United Water Restoration Group.

We provide services in Ormond Beach, Florida, Jacksonville, Florida, Daytona Beach, Florida, Orlando, Florida, Tampa, Florida, Melbourne, Florida, and many other locations around Florida!