Surprisingly, clogged gutters are the #1 cause of water seeping into your home’s basement. It happens everyday throughout Tennessee and is a serious matter that should not be overlooked. Defective, broken or dirty gutters can cause clogs, which can lead to overflowing gutters and major damage to your home, as well as the strong possibility of flooding in your basement or crawl space.
There are several ways that this rainwater, overflowing your gutters, can end up in your basement. It might be that the gutters were improperly installed on your home. For example, if you have open gutters that are mounted to a wall rather than a soffit, rainwater could potentially overflow directly into the wall of the home and down into your basement or crawl space. The rainwater overflowing your clogged gutters can also create trenching on the ground beneath the roofline. Left unaddressed, this repeated overflow will wear down the soil and create a trench that usually will run the length of your gutter system. Basement walls are porous and many have concrete cracks, and water from these trenches can seep down the foundation wall into your basement itself.
To avoid this potentially disastrous rainwater seepage issue in your home, and to keep rainwater out of your home’s basement, it’s important to have Glide Force Gutters clean your gutters twice per year, so they can provide proper drainage to safely direct rainwater away from your home. If you’re interested in the peace of mind that comes with clean gutters and a well working rain gutter system, call Glide Force Gutters today.
By Gene Austin and Knight-Ridder Newspapers, Chicago Tribune
Q-We have a problem with water coming into our basement at least once or twice a year during heavy rains. We are thinking of having a drain installed in the basement floor. Could that solve our problem? What do you suggest?
A-Basement water during heavy rains is often caused by poor drainage of the rain after it runs off the roof. In many cases, rain gutters or downspouts are clogged, leaking, improperly sloped or simply inadequate to handle the water runoff. Instead of being carried away from the home, the rainwater is dumped close to the foundation, where it saturates the earth and eventually works its way into the basement through tiny cracks or porous walls.
I suggest a careful inspection and cleaning of the gutter system and repair of any obvious leaks or malfunctions. Make sure all downspouts are set up to carry the water well away from the house; downspout extensions, splash pans and similar devices can be used for this purpose, but sometimes earth around the home needs to be banked to cause a flow away from the foundation.
After the gutters are cleaned and repaired, go outside during a heavy rain and look for any points where the gutters are overflowing or drainage is poor. More downspouts or slope adjustments are sometimes needed. Make notes of the problems, and repair them when the weather improves. Above all, perform regular inspections and maintenance to keep the gutters free of leaves and debris and in good repair.
As for the drain, it might help get water out of the basement, but will do nothing to keep it out. Homeowners need to be careful about using some once-popular methods of controlling basement water, such as sump pits, trench- type drains around the inside perimeter of the basement and even floor drains. Such openings are sometimes major sources of radon infiltration, and if a home has a radon problem, the openings must sometimes be sealed and/or vented. One way to remove basement water without pits or floor openings is a sumpless sump pump, which sits at a low spot on the floor and pumps out any accumulated water.
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