Protect Your Home from Severe Weather in Spring

As spring brings warmer weather and heavy rains, it can always bring water damage and flooding into your home. Water damage is never convenient, but fortunately, most of the time flooding and water damage can be prevented. Follow these tips to prepare for the coming spring thaw and help secure your home from excess water.

Do a Roof Check.

Start at the top of your house and work your way down. Something small like a cracked shingle could lead to something much bigger down the line. Water could leak into the crack into the attic and downward into the home, causing mold and structural damage. Damaged areas of your roof can also be ideal spots for critters to sneak into your home. Use caution and a ladder to go up on your roof to inspect it up close or use binoculars to look from the ground. Look for cracked, curling, damaged, or missing shingles, damage to the chimney cap, cracks in the caulk or rubber around the vent pipe, and roofing debris in your gutters and downspouts.

Inspect Your House Siding.

The job of your siding is to protect your home and to keep elements outside. Damage to your siding could lead to moisture coming inside your home, and causes rot and structural damage. Look for warping, buckling, cracks, gaps, or holes in the siding. Replace any missing pieces of trim and repair any siding not securely fastened to the house. Watch for any stains or discolorations on siding, as that could mean existing damage beneath that may have already seeped into your home, and may require further inspection by professionals.

Clean out Your Gutters.

This may be the most underrated part of spring cleaning. Since spring is rainy season, gutters provide your first level of defense against keeping water away from your home. Check for clogs in your gutters created by leaves, sticks, or other debris. Look for standing water, which may mean there’s a clog or blockage in the downspout. Look for cracks, leaks, or missing sealant in gutter seams. Secure any parts of the gutter that have pulled away from the roof. Finally, make sure water doesn’t pool at the bottom of the downspout. If it does, extend the downspout to ensure water flows away from your home.

Check Your House Foundation.

One of the most common problems that leads to flooded basements is issues with the foundation. Look for cracks, chips, or crumbling concrete. Make sure there isn’t any bulges, bowing, or deformities on your foundation walls, and that there isn’t any water pooling outside at the base of the home. Inside the basement or crawl space, look for any signs of moisture weeping or dripping. Also looks for cracks and gaps where there are windows, doors, and seams where the walls meet the ceiling.

Landscape for Flood Prevention.

This area of your home tends to be missed when thinking about preventing flooding in the home, but issues like an improperly graded lawn, could provide an easy path for melting snow and rain to flow right into your home. Make sure your yard is sloping away from your home; if it’s not, regrade it. Manage trees, branches, and shrubs that may be too close to your house, and could damage your roof, siding, or foundation. Repair, remove, or replace cracking or lifting cement walkways.

Spring may be on its way, but that doesn’t mean water damage has to come with it. Taking these five steps will go a long way to ensuring your home stays flood-free during these wetter months.

Have Water Damage and Need Help?

Alpha Omega is a fully certified restoration company serving Billings, MT and the surrounding areas. Water inside the home needs dried quickly to prevent further problems like mold growth and rotting. Before you do any work to remove the water yourself, call Alpha Omega Disaster Restoration for inspection.

Our crew is on call 24/7 and we will come to assess the situation, document the damage, and then we will work with your insurance adjuster to provide you the fastest and best water restoration possible. With our help you can focus on your family and relationships, while you let us worry about restoring your physical property to its pre-disaster state. When we are done, all traces of the destruction will be gone, and you will be left with a safe and comfortable home.