7 Signs of Gutter Damage on Your Home
If you are like most people, your rain gutters aren’t something you really think about. They need routine gutter cleaning, but besides that, their functionality is incredibly simple.
It’s not until your gutters aren’t doing what they’re supposed to that you understand how important they are for your home!
WHAT DO GUTTERS DO?
Gutters and downspouts go virtually unnoticed on most roofs in Freeport. They blend into the exterior unless the homeowner preferred copper or wood … materials that are definitely designed to stand out! Most are crafted from durable yet lightweight aluminum or vinyl siding.
The purpose of gutters is to create a path of least resistance for rain and snow to get off your roof as fast as possible. When they’re in good condition, your gutters will direct runoff away from the home’s foundation and landscaping, protecting your home’s exterior from mildew and mold, the foundation and basement from leaking water, and the gutters themselves from wear and rust.
When they are damaged, it can lead to thousands of dollars’ worth of damage to your house and property.
ARE YOUR GUTTERS DAMAGED?
Gutter damage is too simple to fix to be the cause of major home repairs! Keeping an eye on your gutters is simple and safe. If you identify any of the following issues, it’s a pretty good clue that your gutters have some type of damage.
As soon as you find a possible gutter issue, you can decide whether it’s something you are comfortable fixing or remedying by yourself or if it’s something you’d rather hire a gutter service to handle.
Sitting Water Near Your Home
Sitting water is a good sign that your gutters or downspouts are not directing the rain runoff away from your house the way they are designed to. Pooling water can result in mold, weakening of your foundation, and creates the perfect habitat for mosquitoes. And, it will leave the areas surrounding your house constantly wet 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 exterior of your house. Mold and mildew mean there is too much moisture around that area – a possible problem with the gutters could be to blame. Remember that mold and mildew are likely to appear on the north side of a house anyway, so if that’s where they’re growing, it may be because that area gets very little direct sunlight. This is a time where the advice and expertise of a gutter specialist in Freeport would be a great help.
Rain Pouring Over the Gutter
You’ll need to wait until it’s raining to look for this gutter problem. Hopefully this doesn’t mean you have gutter damage. It might just be that the gutter is full of debris and needs to be cleaned out. Either way, you want to have it looked at ASAP.
Basement Leaks
Depending on the design of your basement, the leaking might be due to any number of things. The pooling problem we discussed earlier could definitely cause a basement leak. Egress windows and even cinder block walls will only block out so much water. That’s why it is so important to keep your gutters in good condition!
Landscaping or Lawn Damage
Rain gutters empty directly onto the ground in most cases, and landscaping should be laid out to work with this water flow to help it submerge into the ground. However, a leaking gutter or clogged gutter will allow rainfall to overflow or pool where it isn’t supposed to. This standing rain water can kill plants by force or by overwatering. It might also displace flower bed materials like mulch or rock.
Water Marks
Water marks are the first sign that there is a lot of moisture on a surface. Water marks are sometimes left behind even if standing water has evaporated or dissipated into the ground. You will usually find water marks under the gutters or directly behind the downspouts. This is a usually an indication that water is pouring down the outside of the gutters and not staying inside of them.
Visible Gutter Damage
The final sign of gutter damage is the easiest to spot. If your gutters are bent, sagging or cracked, they obviously have damage. Following a storm, it’s a good idea to walk around your house to assess any damage to the roof, outer walls, and gutters. These inspections are in addition to your standard home inspections.
HOW TO PROTECT YOUR GUTTERS?
Here are a couple of easy tips Freeport Gutter Force recommends to help prevent gutter damage:
Clean your gutters out at least one time a year. You can lengthen the time between gutter repairs by having them cleaned out regularly. Like with anything else, the better you maintain your gutters, the less problems you’ll have with them.
The optimal time to clean gutters is in the spring, but to be extra cautious, give them a cleaning in the fall, too. Many homeowners choose to clean their gutters themselves, but there are professional gutter cleaning companies that offer this service so you don’t have to deal with the work or the risk.
Check your gutters often. Signs of damage can often be visible from the outside of the gutters. A quick inspection – with both feet firmly on the ground – should reveal any of the signs we wrote about above.
We’d suggest that you complete an exterior home inspection following each season to be sure that your gutters are working properly.
When you see signs of gutter damage, act fast. Taking care of a problem 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 be replaced very affordably.
But, if you let the issue go on too long, you could end up needing repairs in your basement, replacing vinyl siding or redoing an entire area of landscaping.