7 Signs of Gutter Damage on Your Home
If you’re like a lot of homeowners, your gutters aren’t something you often think about. They need routine gutter cleaning, but besides that, their purpose is very simple.
It’s not until gutters aren’t doing their job that you understand how important they are for your home!
WHAT DO GUTTERS DO?
Gutters and downspouts go unnoticed on most homes in Long Island. They fade into the exterior unless the homeowner has opted for copper or wood … materials that are definitely designed to stand out! Most home exteriors are crafted from durable yet lightweight aluminum or vinyl siding.
The point of rain gutters is to provide a path of minimal resistance for rain to get off your roof as fast as possible. When they’re in good shape, your rain gutters will direct runoff away from the home’s foundation and landscaping, protecting your home’s exterior from mold and mildew, the foundation and basement from leaking water, and the rain gutters themselves from wear and rust.
When they are damaged, it can cause thousands of dollars’ worth of damage to your house and surrounding property.
ARE YOUR GUTTERS DAMAGED?
Gutter damage is too simple to repair to be the reason for major home repairs! Inspecting your gutters is simple and safe. If you identify any of the following issues, it’s a strong indication that your rain gutters have some kind of damage.
Once you find a possible gutter issue, you can decide if it’s something you are comfortable repairing or remedying by yourself or if it’s a project you’d rather hire a gutter repairman for.
Sitting Water Near Your Home
Standing water is a good sign that your gutters or downspouts are not sending the rain 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 pesky mosquitoes. Plus, it will make the areas around your home consistently wet 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 mean there is a lot of moisture around that area – a possible problem with the gutters could be to blame. Keep in mind that mildew and mold are more likely to grow on the north side of a house anyway, so if that’s where they’re appearing, it may just be because that area gets very little direct sunlight. This is a time when the advice and knowledge of a professional in Long Island would be helpful.
Rain Pouring Over the Gutter
You will have to wait until it’s actually raining to notice this type of gutter problem. Hopefully this doesn’t mean that your gutters are damaged. It could just be that the gutter is full of debris and needs to be cleaned out. Either way, you want to have it checked ASAP.
Basement Leaks
Depending on the design of your basement, your leak could be caused by any number of things. The standing water problem we mentioned before could definitely cause a basement leak. Egress windows and cinder block walls will only keep out so much water. That’s why it is so necessary to keep your gutters in good shape!
Landscaping or Lawn Damage
Gutters pour directly onto the ground in most cases, and landscaping should be designed to work with this flow of water 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 pooling 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 a visible sign that there is too much moisture on a surface. Water marks are sometimes left behind even if pooling water has evaporated or dissipated. You usually see water marks under the rain gutters or behind the downspouts. This is a typically a sign that water is streaming down the outside of the gutters rather than staying inside of them.
Visible Gutter Damage
The last sign of gutter damage is the simplest to find. If your gutters are bent, sagging or cracked, they definitely have damage. Following a storm, it’s a smart idea to walk around your home to identify any possible damage to the roof shingles, exterior, and gutters. These inspections are in addition to your standard home inspections.
HOW TO PROTECT YOUR GUTTERS?
Here are some easy tips Long Island Gutter Solutions recommends to prevent gutter damage:
Clean your gutters at least once each year. You can lengthen the time between gutter repairs by having them cleaned out regularly. As with anything else, the better you maintain your rain gutters, the less problems you’ll experience with them.
The best time to clean out gutters is in the spring, but to be cautious, give them a good cleaning in the fall, too. Many homeowners clean their gutters themselves, but there are many local gutter cleaning companies that provide this service so you don’t have to handle the mess or the risk.
Inspect your gutters often. Signs of damage can often be visible from the outside of the gutters. Just a fast inspection – with both feet firmly on the ground – will reveal any of the issues we wrote about above.
We’d suggest that you complete an exterior home inspection at the end of each season to confirm that your gutters are functioning the right way.
When you see signs of gutter damage, act fast. Fixing 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 be replaced very affordably and quickly.
However, if you let the issue go on too long, you could end up making repairs in your basement, replacing expensive vinyl siding or redoing an entire section of landscaping.