As storms approach, you will want to do all you can to prevent damage to your home. From excessive wind to heavy rain, storm damage can occur quickly. If you aren’t prepared for this damage, it can feel overwhelming.
It is essential to know what to look out for when preparing to protect your home from damage because the damage is much easier to prevent than to repair after the fact. If you’re hoping to avoid storm damage to your home, you’ll want to carefully look at each of the following items carefully and prepare your home with the help of home restoration experts.
1. Look At Your Trees And Shrubs
Trees and shrubs, if left untended, can cause significant damage to your home and surrounding properties during a storm. To protect your home and others from damage caused by trees and shrubs, you should look at them to gauge whether they require pruning. Properly pruning your trees and shrubs can prevent loose branches from breaking off and damaging siding or windows.
Looking at your trees and shrubs also allows you to determine if there are any dying branches you need to remove or if it is starting to rot. If the plant is dying or dead, you should call an expert to remove it before it causes more substantial problems for your home.
2. Check Your Roof
During a wind storm, your roof can take a pretty bad hit. Wind can pry up loose shingles, and rain can seep through holes in the roof you may not notice. Before a storm, check on your roof to ensure it is storm ready. If your shingles are loose, a professional must nail them down properly to prevent them from getting ripped off the roof.
If you are missing shingles before a storm, this gap can create a hole for the wind to affect surrounding shingles, creating an even more significant problem than before. If you leave your roof unattended, a storm can cause substantial damage to your home.
3. Clean Up Your Yard
Things like yard furniture, tools, pots, and kids’ toys can become projectiles and cause damage to your home’s windows, walls, and doors during a storm. If a storm is coming in, you’ll want to do a yard walk-through to ensure any furniture is staked down to avoid getting swept up by the wind. You’ll also want to grab loose toys and bring them inside the house. You should store your tools inside your garage or shed and bring potted plants into your home or garage to prevent them from getting swept up by the wind.
4. Repair Broken Siding
Much like with broken or missing shingles, broken siding can cause significant problems for your home during a storm. Before a storm causes damage to your home, take a walk around your home to determine if anything has broken your siding. If there are holes in your siding, you need to call a professional to get it patched. Broken or damaged siding can allow water to get in, causing water damage to the walls inside your home. If left unattended for quite some time, it can eventually lead to mold or mildew growth. Wind can also rip at your siding, creating more significant gaps than you originally had.
5. Check The Cracks
You should check your home for any cracks in your walls or foundation. The cracks need to be sealed if you’re trying to protect your home from damage. Cracks in your home’s walls and foundation can lead to flooding in your home or under the foundation. With this, you’ll also want to ensure your sump pump works. If your sump pump isn’t working, flooding in your home will worsen.
6. Double Check Drainage
Before a large storm, you’ll want to check that water drains correctly on your property. Checking drainage around your home includes ensuring water isn’t pooling near your home’s foundation and that your gutters are not obstructed by debris. Clogged gutters may redirect water toward your home, causing flooding in your basement or leaks in your foundation.
Water pooling near your foundation can cause significant damage to your home, including sagging foundations. To prevent damage to your home, you’ll need to ensure water can flow freely away from the building.
Recovering From Storm Damage With Liberty Restoration
If you’re dealing with storm damage to your home, you need a team of experts who can come in and make repairs quickly. Our team at Liberty Restoration can help you recover from wind damage, flood restoration, board-up services, and more. If you’re in need of storm damage restoration or would like to speak with one of our experts, contact our team today.