Flooding in the home can be very damaging, and truly is not something that anyone wants to deal with. But flooding is hugely common, with up to 14,000 people dealing with a related emergency each and every day here in the United States alone. In addition to this, up to 37% of all people have actually faced the loss of possessions to boot. For a great many people, flooding can be a huge financial drain, and can take an emotional toll as well. After all, flooding frequently occurs in basements, which a great many people use primarily as storage. When this happens, precious memorabilia and family heirlooms can all too easily be lost. Fortunately, there are steps that can be taken to prevent flooding entirely – or to at least somewhat minimize the damage that is caused by it, making it so that this damage can be dealt with much more easily than what would have otherwise been the case.
For instance, you can even help to prevent flooding at the time that your house is being built. This is due to the fact that installing a good foundation will reduce the chances of flooding ever occuring. Foundation contractors should always be hired for such projects, as a foundation contractor will have the know how that is very much needed for building a home. They will help you to choose the right kind of foundation – which is hugely important in its own right – and will help to ensure that this foundation is properly built. This alone will go a long way towards avoiding issues such as those related to flooding. From crawl space foundations to slab foundations to basement foundations (the three main types of foundations that are currently used), the above will apply.
Of course, there are steps you can take later on that will help in such matters as well. For instance, waterproofing your basement can be a great step to take for reducing water damage or flooding of any kind. Exterior waterproofing is just one type of waterproofing out there, but exterior waterproofing alone can go a great deal towards keeping your home in good shape. Exterior waterproofing might be a bit costly, but the payoff of this exterior waterproofing is more than worth it at the end of the day, to say the very least. And in addition to exterior waterproofing, everything from crawl space encapsulation services to basement waterproofing services can also be utilized – though even just exterior waterproofing measures in and of itself can have a considerable impact, to say the very least on the subject.
In addition to waterproofing measures such as exterior waterproofing and the like, taking day to day precautions is also likely to be beneficial. For instance, gutter placement can actually play into this quite a bit. Ideally, you’ll want to place your gutters very specifically for this to be the case. This placement should mean that all water is diverted from your home by at least ten feet, which will allow very little risk to be posed to your foundation from your gutter system. On top of this, taking care to place your plants accordingly is also something that can play a big role in your foundation’s overall quality, and can negate the need for foundation repair down the line. At the end of the day, even just taking small steps such as these, apart even from something like exterior waterproofing, can make a considerable difference indeed.
At the end of the day, flooding can be a truly devastating thing indeed. Ultimately, flooding is something that happens a lot, as more than 95% of all basements in the United States will actually experience flooding at some point in time. Fortunately, there are steps that can be taken not just to prevent flooding, but to mitigate the damage of flooding should it still occur. From properly built foundations to exterior waterproofing to gutter placement and gardening, the options are endless – or nearly so – and investing time and money into them might at first feel overwhelming, but is something that will absolutely pay off at the end of the day.
