7 Signs of Gutter Damage on Your Home
If you’re like a lot of homeowners, your gutters aren’t something you really think about. They need biannual gutter cleaning, but otherwise, their functionality is incredibly simple.
It’s not until your rain gutters aren’t doing their job that you realize just how important they are!
WHAT DO GUTTERS DO?
Gutters and downspouts go unnoticed on most homes in Roseville. They blend into the home’s exterior unless the homeowner has opted for copper or wood … building materials that are designed to stand out! Most home exteriors are made of durable but lightweight aluminum or vinyl siding.
The purpose of gutters is to create a route of minimal resistance for rain and snow to get off your roof. When they’re in good condition, your gutters will route runoff away from the home’s foundation and landscaping, protecting your home’s exterior from mildew and mold, the foundation and basement from leaks, and the rain gutters themselves from rust.
When gutters 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 reason for 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.
Once you find a gutter issue, you can decide whether it’s something you feel comfortable repairing or remedying by yourself or if it’s a project you should trust a gutter company for.
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 cause mold, weakening of your foundation, and creates the perfect habitat for mosquitoes. Plus, it will leave the areas surrounding your house constantly soggy and muddy.
Mold or Mildew
Mold or mildew is a bad sign, whether you see mold or mildew on the rain gutters or on the exterior of your house. Mold and mildew indicate that there is too much moisture in that area – a potential issue with the gutters could be the cause. Remember that mold and mildew are more likely to grow on the north side of a home anyway, so if that’s where they’re appearing, it may just be because that area doesn’t get a lot of direct sunlight on it. This is a situation when the advice and knowledge of a professional in Roseville would be a great help.
Rain Pouring Over the Gutter
You’ll need to wait until it’s raining to find this gutter issue. 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. In either case, you want to have it checked right away.
Basement Leaks
Based on the construction of your home’s basement, your leak could be due to any number of things. The pooling issue we mentioned before could definitely cause a basement leak. Egress windows and 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
Gutters empty directly onto the ground most of the time, 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 cause rainfall to overflow or pool in areas where it shouldn’t. This water can kill plants by force or by overwatering. It will also displace flower bed materials like mulch or rock.
Water Marks
Water marks are the first sign that there is excessive moisture on a surface. Water marks are left behind even if standing water has evaporated or dissipated. You usually find water marks right beneath the rain gutters or directly behind the downspouts. This is a usually an indication that rain 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 the easiest to spot. If your gutters are bent, sagging or cracked, they have damage. Following a storm, it’s a smart idea to walk around your home to identify any possible damage to the roof shingles, outer walls, and gutters. These inspections are in addition to your routine home inspections.
HOW TO PROTECT YOUR GUTTERS?
Here are some easy ways Roseville Gutter Service recommends to help prevent gutter damage:
Clean your gutters at least one time each year. You can lengthen the amount of time between gutter repairs by keeping them cleaned out. Like with anything else, the better you care for your rain gutters, the less problems you’ll experience with them.
The best time to clean out gutters is during the spring, but to be extra cautious, give them a good cleaning in the fall, too. A lot of homeowners clean their gutters themselves, but there are many professional gutter cleaning companies that provide this service so you don’t have to deal with the mess or the risk.
Check your gutters often. Signs of damage can be visible from the outside of the gutters. A fast inspection – with both feet firmly on the ground – will reveal any of the problems we mentioned above.
We’d recommend that you do an exterior home inspection following each season to be sure that your gutters are working correctly.
When you see signs of gutter damage, act fast. Taking care of an issue before it becomes too bad can save you a lot of 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.
However, if you let the problem go on for too long, you might end up needing repairs in your basement, replacing vinyl siding or redoing an entire area of landscaping.