7 Signs of Gutter Damage on Your Home
If you’re like most homeowners, your rain gutters are not something you often think about. They need biannual gutter cleaning, but otherwise, their functionality is very simple.
It’s not until rain gutters aren’t doing their job that you understand how important they are for your home!
WHAT DO GUTTERS DO?
Gutters and downspouts go virtually unnoticed on most roofs in Colorado Springs. They fade 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 crafted from durable but lightweight aluminum or vinyl siding.
The point of rain gutters is to provide a route of least resistance for rain and snow to get off your roof as fast as possible. When they are in good condition, your rain gutters will direct runoff away from the home’s foundation and landscaping, will protect your home’s exterior from mold and mildew, the foundation and basement from leaks, and the rain gutters themselves from rust.
When they are damaged, it can cause thousands of dollars’ worth of damage to your home and property.
ARE YOUR GUTTERS DAMAGED?
Gutter damage is too easy to fix to be the cause of any major home repairs! Keeping an eye on your gutters is easy and safe. If you notice 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 problem, 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 service for.
Sitting Water Near Your Home
Sitting water is a good sign that your gutters or downspouts are not routing the water runoff away from your house the way they should be. Pooling water can lead to mold, weakening of your foundation, and provides the perfect habitat for mosquitoes. Plus, it will leave the areas around your home consistently soggy and muddy.
Mold or Mildew
Either one of these is a sign of gutter damage, whether you see mold or mildew on the gutters or the sides of your house. Mold and mildew mean there is a lot of moisture around that area – a potential issue with the rain gutters could be to blame. Remember that mold and mildew are likely to appear on the north side of a home anyway, so if that’s where these substances are growing, it might just be because that area doesn’t get a lot of direct sunlight. This is a scenario when the advice and knowledge of a professional in Colorado Springs would be a great help.
Rain Pouring Over the Gutter
You will need to wait until it’s actually raining to find this type of gutter problem. Hopefully this doesn’t mean your gutters are damaged. It might just be that the gutter is clogged with debris and needs to be cleaned. In either case, you want to have it looked at ASAP.
Basement Leaks
Depending on the construction of your home’s basement, your leak could be due to any number of things. The standing water issue we discussed before could definitely cause a basement leak. Egress windows and even cinder block walls can only keep out so much water. That’s why it is so important to keep your gutters in good shape!
Landscaping or Lawn Damage
Rain gutters empty directly onto the ground most of the time, and landscaping should be designed to work with this flow of water to help it disperse into the ground. But, a leaking gutter or clogged gutter will allow rainfall to overflow or pool where it shouldn’t. This pooling rain water can kill plants either 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 sometimes left behind even if standing water has evaporated or dissipated. You usually find water marks beneath the 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 by far the simplest to find. If your gutters are bent, sagging or cracked, they obviously have damage. Following a storm, it’s a smart idea to walk around your house to assess any 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 a few easy tips The Colorado Springs Gutter Company recommends to prevent gutter damage:
Clean your gutters at least once a year. You can lengthen the time between gutter repairs by having them cleaned out regularly. As with anything else, the better you care for your rain gutters, the fewer problems you’ll experience with them.
The recommended time to clean out gutters is during the spring, but to be extra cautious, give them a good cleaning in the fall, too. Many homeowners choose to clean their gutters themselves, but there are professional gutter cleaning companies that provide this service so you don’t have to deal with the work or the risk.
Inspect your gutters often. Signs of damage can often be visible from the outside of the gutters. Just a quick inspection – with both feet firmly on the ground – will reveal any of the issues we mentioned above.
We’d suggest that you do an exterior home inspection at the end of each season to confirm that your gutters are functioning 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 too long, you could end up making repairs in your basement, replacing vinyl siding or redoing an entire area of landscaping.