Tips to Protect Your Home or Building from Rain and Floods

09 Sep, 2022

Understand How Water Moves Around Your Building Or Home

It is important to determine how water flows around your building or house when it rains, or better yet, before it rains. Water will either run towards your home or away from it, the latter being the ideal scenario. Whether or not this happens mainly comes down to the slope or grading of the ground surrounding the exterior walls where they touch the ground. If the ground around the home isn’t sloped correctly and you notice water accumulating, you may want to look into ways of correcting the slope or putting in drainage to handle moving water away from the building envelope. A common place for water to get in is runoff from a driveway. Installing a strip drain in-front of a garage can move water away and keeping it from inside. On a wet day, walk around your property to observe how water is behaving.

Keep Drains, Gutters, And Downspouts Clean

Another strategy to keep water away from your building or home is to ensure that the drains, gutters and downspouts are clear. This involves clearing them of any debris like leaves, dirt, sticks, garbage, etc. so that water can flow freely. Installing gutter guards and leaf screens can be effective in preventing debris build up and blockages.

Ensure Water Valves Are Installed And Working

To ensure that no sewage water backs up into your building or home, it is recommended that an exterior or interior back-flow is installed. It is advised to install valves on all pipes entering the house or building.

Keep Electrical And Climate Systems Safe

If your building or house floods, you will want to make sure that any electrical or climate systems are safe. The best way to do this is to ensure things like your air-condition units, water heater, circuit breakers, etc. sit above the predicted flood level. Know or predict your property’s flood level, and then ensure these electrical and climate systems sit at least above the expected flood level.