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Drip, Drip, Drip….

February 23rd, 2015

With all the snow we’ve been having there are huge ice dams on the back of the house. It seems there’s water coming in somewhere, it’s dripping down the walls in the kitchen and running down the walls below it in the basement. From the looks of the wood down there this isn’t a new thing.
Leak
From the looks of the wood down there this isn’t a new thing, it’s been happening for a while, probably mostly in the winter. We’ll add this to the “con” list for remodeling this house. With the water damage we found while putting in the kitchen fan it seems like there will be quite a bit of damage from these leaks. I’m just hoping it doesn’t make any of the drywall come down, we’ll keep our fingers crosses.

Have you ever dealt with a leaky roof?

7 Comments to “Drip, Drip, Drip….”
  1. Ilene on February 23, 2015 at 8:28 am

    We had a leak on the roof near the fireplace and the water came into the fireplace from that. We were lucky that our ceiling wasn’t damaged. When we called the roofer he discovered we had broken grout between the bricks of our chimney so he fixed all that and put sealer on the bricks. Ka-ching! $500. But could’ve been a lot worse.

    We also had a leaky shower upstairs that sent water streaming down the wall in the room underneath. That was pretty expensive to fix, much more than $500, but I don’t remember how much exactly.

    And also we had a water heater that had a failed seal where the water lines connect to the heater. That soaked the floor in the hall and the pantry and then ran out into the garage and driveway while we were gone one day.

    It’s a constant struggle to try to keep the outside, outside, isn’t it? I guess that’s why vacant houses fall into disrepair so quickly.

    I’m so sorry you are in this awful snow thing, I don’t know whether to hope for a quick thaw or a slow one, both have their down sides. I do hope it will quit snowing now and let us all go into spring.

    At least you don’t have termites! There are termites in one out of three homes here in Oklahoma, and they do some horrible damage. We had them in the house we lived in before we moved to our present home, and it required us to replace an entire outside wall, and the footing of another. The exterminator told us they were about to get into our attic. SHEESH…..

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  2. Myra S. on February 23, 2015 at 11:11 am

    When we lived in Kentucky our roof started leaking after a particularly hard summer rain. We put on a metal roof and no more problems. It was just impossible to figure out exactly where the shingles were leaking and a metal roof was the best solution. Fortunately, we didn’t have any real damage. Ah, the joys of owning a house!

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  3. Toni on February 23, 2015 at 12:27 pm

    Oh my gosh! This reminds me of our home in Mexico (a manufactured one). One night, during a rainstorm I awoke to water dripping on my pillow! The next morning we put a blue tarp over our bedroom until we could look into fixing the roof. When we finally could, we discovered that there was no “roof”, plywood or otherwise there! Just some tarpaper! Cost us a pretty penny, even in Mexico!

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  4. val on February 23, 2015 at 1:39 pm

    So sorry you are having to endure this!
    We had a copper a/c condensate line running in the attic above our kitchen that had pin holes and slowly leaked until the 3/4 inch plaster ceiling absorbed too much–and came down on top of us! Luckily, there was only a bruised leg and a big mess. Insurance paid to close up the 8×8 foot hole.

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  5. Charlie@Seattle Trekker on February 24, 2015 at 3:44 am

    A good time to stop and count the blessings…

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  6. Tiffany Selvey on February 24, 2015 at 9:38 am

    Ug! Dealing with water damage is such a pain and I can’t imagine dealing with it in conjunction with snow. Good luck!

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  7. Nebraska Dave on February 26, 2015 at 12:08 pm

    Susy, according all radio home improvement talk shows, unless water is controlled, it wins. I’ve had many water issues over the years. Some have been plumbing issues and others have been basement leakage issues. Nature has a way of relentlessly pursuing what it wants. Water is one of those elements that has all the time in the world to wear down a blockage. We can only temporarily win the war against water but after we are gone or vacate a property or building, it deteriorates pretty quick. Water issues don’t go away and must dealt with quickly.

    Right now my issue is with condensation from a furnace flue that runs horizontally half way across my kitchen ceiling before exiting up through the roof. The condensation runs down the flue and drips off the 90 degree bend in the pipe where it goes up through the roof. Therefore the ceiling section will have to be replaced but not before the ventilation issue is solved so this don’t continue to happen. Bad house design, I think.

    Have a great water controlling day.

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This is a daily journal of my efforts to cultivate a more simple life, through local eating, gardening and so many other things. We used to live in a small suburban neighborhood Ohio but moved to 153 acres in Liberty, Maine in 2012.

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