Water Damage

What can you do to protect your home and investment from flood damage.

The best answer is to elevate your home although this may not be possible for older homes. If you cannot elevate than you need to reduce damage and we will give you advice on how to do that.

Flood damage can cause your doors, windows, and walls to cave in. But in Florida there is worse damage that is caused after the water recedes, it is mold. Once your house is flooded and the water recedes mold starts to infiltrate. The longer the items are wet the more intense the mold builds and starts to spread.

The first step to reducing the damage is to remove and discard everything that is wet as soon as possible. Remove everything from the house including drywall, carpet, insulation and wet furniture. Please do this after your appraiser comes out or if you have a long wait then take a careful detailed video of everything before and after.

Once you have removed all of the wet contents then you need to dry the house out and apply a mold killer over everything.

You can find suggestions on the CDC website and bleach is an easy to source product.

Your air conditioning can be used to remove moisture in the home, have your ac running at a lower than normal temp so it continues to cycle and pull moisture from the air. You can also purchase/rent a dehumidifier as well.

Once you dry the home you will need to assess the damage along with creating a list of repairs and itemized costs.

Wood framing needs to be treated so mold does not come back, any wet drywall needs to be removed. Wet electrical wires have to be replaced as well. If you have any low HVAC vents that were flooded they should be replaced or looked at.

You also need to put some thought into this, what will stop this from happening again?

Prevention

Can you prevent future flooding? Maybe or most likely maybe not.

You can prevent future damage and this is what we are going to cover.

Change your design style along with materials. If possible elevate your entry doors and waterproof the sills.

Use cement board in place of drywall, replace carpets with stone or tile, install stone/tile base moldings.

Use rigid foam for insulation instead of fiberglass, raise wires and ductwork,

Use cabinetry that is wall mounted and elevated from the floor (european look).

Try to use materials at floor level that will not absorb moisture. Treat these areas as if the walls and floors are a bathroom shower.

Laticrete makes a water proofing application that is painted on and will seal the floor and the wall. Apply it all over your concrete floor and up the wall making sure the inside corner is covered generously. Cover the water proofing with tile or paint. What you created is a stop for water to penetrate behind your walls and mitigated the damage to contents on the floor rather than destruction of your walls.

For more information or a free consultation, contact Iridium Development 561-597-0021

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