Dealing With Water Damage Around The Home
by
Eloise
4 Materials
$20
4 Hours
Medium
Over the years we’ve had a few issues with water damage around our home, so I've decided to share my top tips on dealing with different types of damage. In some cases there was a DIY solution, and in others it was important to know when to call in an expert!
Bay Window Roof Leak
This bay window clearly had some roofing felt that had deteriorated. I called in a builder to replace as the window is on the first floor, and then removed the worst of the damaged plaster before filling in with an ordinary DIY filler. Finally, I repainted the damaged section to match the rest of the room.
Ceiling Leak
This old ceiling is the original lathe and plaster and had a leak from the bath above. Once all the old plaster had been pulled off, I let the wooden lathes dry out naturally and then re-plastered it with some ready-mixed textured plaster and painted it. You can just about see the join, but I think it looks fine for a patch-up job.
Wet Drywall/Plasterboard
We had some house renovations done and while the roof was only partially complete the heavens opened and we had leaks all over the house. Because the drywall is part of the structure we didn’t want to tackle this ourselves and got a contractor in who brought specialist drying equipment to do a really thorough job. There are lots of companies, like ServiceMaster, who specialize in work like this.
Brick and Plaster Damp
This little white pipe is the toilet (freshwater) overflow but is snapped off and we didn’t notice which led to damp coming down the wall and caused this horrible brown staining on the plaster.
Because the plaster stayed in reasonable condition, I treated this with a coat of Stain Stop Paint and then some normal emulsion paint.
Top Tips for Dealing with Water Damage
- Try to stop water getting in in the first place. Notice odd water or patches and try to find out why ASAP.
- Know where your water stopcock is in case you need to switch off the whole supply for a bit.
- Most modern plumbing has these little isolation valves on, which means can you switch off the supply just to that item. This one is on my toilet and I have another on the washing machine connection pipes. Just take a screwdriver and turn it a quarter turn.
- Keep a few old towels and plastic pots to hand so that you can catch water as it leaks and reduce the change of it causing damage.
- Tackle small repair jobs yourself but call in the professionals for anything you are not confident about doing yourself.
Water damage isn't the end of the world when you know how to deal with it. The tips above should help you prepare for the worst!
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