7 Signs of Gutter Damage on Your Home
If you’re like many homeowners, your rain gutters are not something you often worry about. They need routine gutter cleaning, but besides that, their purpose is very simple.
It’s not until your gutters aren’t doing their job that you understand how important they are!
WHAT DO GUTTERS DO?
Gutters and downspouts go virtually unnoticed on most roofs in Farmington Hills. They blend into the home’s exterior unless the homeowner decided on copper or wood … materials that are meant to stand out! Most home exteriors are crafted from durable yet lightweight aluminum or vinyl siding.
The purpose of rain gutters is to provide a path of least resistance for rain and snow to get off your roof quickly. When they’re in good condition, your rain gutters will lead runoff away from the foundation and landscaping, protecting your home’s exterior from mold and mildew, the concrete and pavement and basement from leaking water, and the rain gutters themselves from wear and rust.
When they are damaged, it can cause thousands of dollars’ worth of damage to your house and property.
ARE YOUR GUTTERS DAMAGED?
Gutter damage is too simple to repair to be the cause of major home repairs! Inspecting your gutters is easy and safe. If you see any of the following signs, it’s a pretty strong clue that your gutters have some type of damage.
As soon as you identify a possible gutter issue, you can decide whether it’s something you are comfortable repairing or remedying on your own or if it’s a project you’d rather hire a gutter company to handle.
Sitting Water Near Your Home
Standing water near your home is a sure sign that your gutters or downspouts are not routing the water runoff away from your house the way they should be. Standing water can lead to mold, weakening of your foundation, and creates the perfect habitat for mosquitoes. Plus, it will make the areas surrounding your home perpetually soggy and muddy.
Mold or Mildew
Either one of these is a bad sign, whether you see mold or mildew on the rain gutters or on the sides of your house. Mold and mildew indicate that there is a lot of moisture around that area – a potential issue with the gutters could be to blame. Keep in mind that mildew and mold are likely to grow on the north side of a house anyway, so if that’s where they’re growing, it might be because that area doesn’t get a lot of direct sunlight. This is a scenario when the advice and expertise of a professional in Farmington Hills would be a great help.
Rain Pouring Over the Gutter
You will need to wait until it’s raining to notice this gutter issue. Hopefully this doesn’t mean you have gutter damage. It could just be that the gutter is clogged with debris and needs to be cleaned out. Either way, you want to have it checked right away.
Basement Leaks
Depending on the construction of your basement, your leak could be caused by any number of things. The standing water issue we mentioned before could definitely cause a basement leak. Egress windows and cinder block walls can only block out so much water. That’s why it is so necessary to keep your gutters in good condition!
Landscaping or Lawn Damage
Rain gutters pour directly onto the ground most of the time, and landscaping should be laid out to work with this flow of water to help it submerge into the ground. But, a gutter leak or clogged gutter will allow rainfall to overflow or pool where it shouldn’t. This standing water can destroy plants by force or by overwatering. It can also displace flower bed building materials like mulch or rock.
Water Marks
Water marks are the first sign that there is too much moisture on a surface. Water marks are left behind even if standing water has evaporated or dissipated. You usually find water marks beneath the rain gutters or directly behind the downspouts. This is a usually an indication that water is streaming down the outside of the gutters and not staying inside of them.
Visible Gutter Damage
The final sign of gutter damage is by far the simplest to find. If your gutters are bent, sagging or cracked, they have damage. Following a storm, it’s a good idea to walk around your home to identify any possible damage to the roof, exterior, and rain gutters. These inspections are in addition to your standard home inspections.
HOW TO PROTECT YOUR GUTTERS?
Here are a couple of easy ways Farmington Hills Gutter Service recommends to help prevent gutter damage:
Clean your gutters out at least one time a year. You can extend the time between gutter repairs by having them cleaned out. As with anything else, the better you care for your rain gutters, the fewer issues you’ll experience with them.
The best time to clean out gutters is in the spring, but to be extra cautious, give them a good cleaning in the fall, too. A lot of homeowners choose to clean their gutters themselves, but there are professional gutter cleaning companies that provide this service so you don’t have to deal with the work or the risk.
Inspect your gutters often. Signs of damage can often be visible from the outside of the gutters. Just a fast inspection – with both feet firmly on the ground – should reveal any of the issues we discussed above.
We’d suggest that you do an exterior home inspection after each season to be sure that your gutters are functioning properly.
When you see signs of gutter damage, act fast. Taking care of an issue before it becomes too bad can save you time and money. A small crack, for example, can be sealed, or the section of gutter with the crack can easily be replaced very affordably and quickly.
But, if you let the problem go on for too long, you might end up needing repairs in your basement, replacing expensive vinyl siding or redoing an entire section of landscaping.