Everyone who owns or rents a home should know what to do to prevent water damage. Even if you rent the property that you’re on, it’s in your best interest to take some responsibility for your living space and do what you can do stop water damage, especially if you plan on renting there for a long time.
If you have a washing machine in your home or apartment, it’s a good idea to make sure that the hose doesn’t have any cracks in it. If the hose ruptures and begins to spew water, it won’t be long before your entire laundry room floor is covered in water and starts leaking into the next room. Hoses that connect to your washer should be replaced as many times and as frequently as you need to, but under normal conditions, every three to five years is sufficient.
A leaky water heater is also a cause of water damage in the home and one of the best ways to determine if you have a leaky one is to look for rust or signs that it has leaked in the past. If a water heater is located on a 2nd or higher floor of the home or apartment building, it needs to be installed inside a pan that has a drain connected to a drain in the floor to make sure the water goes into the plumbing system.
Making sure that water is escaping from your roof the way it should be one of the first things on your mind if you want to prevent water damage to your attic and the rest of your house. If you’re just renting an apartment, then this part is mostly up to your landlord or the property manager. If you’re renting a home, then part of this is probably up to you. Cleaning out the gutters and the general maintenance of the property is up to you unless it’s something serious. Making sure the downspouts that are attached to the corners of the house are free of leaves and other debris will drain water away from the foundation of the house and keep it from sinking into the ground. Keeping water draining away from the house and making sure the cracks around your doors and windows are thoroughly caulked and sealed is another step that you can take to keep water from leaking into your home.
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Mold Beats Bleach,Bleach does not kill all mold
What’s the one thing that most of us think cleans and disinfects everything you cover in it? Chlorine bleach. Some new evidence suggests that chlorine bleach isn’t the great cleaner that we all think it is and one of the most common misconceptions about it is that it kills mold. Bleach is good to clean a number of things and to preserve the whiteness of white clothing and other items, but as far as being a disinfectant, it doesn’t measure up.
Unless the mold is located on a non-porous surface such as a hard counter top or a kitchen sink, bleach won’t really do anything to get rid of the mold. You can’t get rid of mold with bleach on surfaces like sheetrock, wood, furniture, or any other surface that isn’t hard and solid. Mold often grows inside walls and even if you clean the mold off of the surface of the wall, you still can’t get inside the sheetrock to completely kill the infection. It infests the entire depth of the board and it’s easier to just remove the sheetrock, clean the mold out from the inside of the wall, and replace the sheetrock with new and paperless sheetrock. Mold eats paper and if you put paper inside your wall, you’re helping it build a home inside your new one.
What we do know about bleach is that it does not play well with other chemicals. Many times when we’re on a budget and we’re trying to make the best of what we have on hand, we mix different household chemicals in order to make more cleaning solution to work with or we’re trying to make ourselves feel like the cleaner has become stronger, because it’s been combined with another. Sometimes mixing household chemicals will do no harm, but it’s best not to mix anything with bleach, especially if it contains ammonia. Ammonia and bleach, when combined, will produce toxic fumes that can kill you if you’re not working in a ventilated area. There are better chemicals to use when fighting mold, so the best thing that you can do is stay away from bleach and never mix it with another ammonia-based cleaner. It’s not worth the risk.
The EPA does not define chlorine bleach as a disinfectant that kills mold. There is always a registration number on each and every product that will kill mold, but this label does not appear on any bottle of chlorine bleach currently in circulation.
Unless the mold is located on a non-porous surface such as a hard counter top or a kitchen sink, bleach won’t really do anything to get rid of the mold. You can’t get rid of mold with bleach on surfaces like sheetrock, wood, furniture, or any other surface that isn’t hard and solid. Mold often grows inside walls and even if you clean the mold off of the surface of the wall, you still can’t get inside the sheetrock to completely kill the infection. It infests the entire depth of the board and it’s easier to just remove the sheetrock, clean the mold out from the inside of the wall, and replace the sheetrock with new and paperless sheetrock. Mold eats paper and if you put paper inside your wall, you’re helping it build a home inside your new one.
What we do know about bleach is that it does not play well with other chemicals. Many times when we’re on a budget and we’re trying to make the best of what we have on hand, we mix different household chemicals in order to make more cleaning solution to work with or we’re trying to make ourselves feel like the cleaner has become stronger, because it’s been combined with another. Sometimes mixing household chemicals will do no harm, but it’s best not to mix anything with bleach, especially if it contains ammonia. Ammonia and bleach, when combined, will produce toxic fumes that can kill you if you’re not working in a ventilated area. There are better chemicals to use when fighting mold, so the best thing that you can do is stay away from bleach and never mix it with another ammonia-based cleaner. It’s not worth the risk.
The EPA does not define chlorine bleach as a disinfectant that kills mold. There is always a registration number on each and every product that will kill mold, but this label does not appear on any bottle of chlorine bleach currently in circulation.
Protect Your Water Pipes from bursting from being frozen
Living in your first home can be an exhilarating experience, but when the winter gets to your area, you may forget about some things that you can do to keep your water pipes from bursting. In fact, you may not think of this at all, since you are probably not used to maintaining a home that belongs to you. Your home is an investment and you should take care of it as much as you can, since you may want to sell it later in exchange for another. Your parents probably insulated the pipes in your home when you were younger, but you probably did not really get the significance of this at the time.
When it gets colder than 20 degrees outside, the water pipes that are exposed to these temperatures are likely to freeze and burst. If you are not home at the time, like off on vacation for Christmas or another holiday, this can wreak havoc on your water bill if you do not get home and fix the problem soon and it can also cause a significant amount of water damage to your home in the process.
Any pipes that will be exposed to this weather that you can get to should be insulated in some way. You can do this by wrapping them in cloth or preferably a construction grade of insulation. A good amount of cloth will help in a pinch, though.
Inside your home, the pipes underneath the different sinks in the house can be kept warm by opening the cabinets so the heat in the house can get to them. Keeping a space heater near exposed pipes in your basement could also be a good idea, but use extreme caution when using space heaters, since they can catch on fire. You can use an extension cord with a space heater, but it needs to be a pretty heavy duty one and most homes do not keep extension cords as heavy duty as the kind needed around often. Place space heaters in your home very carefully and if possible, do not use them on carpeted surfaces.
You can also leave a trickle of water running out of the faucets when the temperatures outside get this low. It might add a little bit to the water bill, but it is only necessary to do this when the temperature gets below freezing, especially at night.
When it gets colder than 20 degrees outside, the water pipes that are exposed to these temperatures are likely to freeze and burst. If you are not home at the time, like off on vacation for Christmas or another holiday, this can wreak havoc on your water bill if you do not get home and fix the problem soon and it can also cause a significant amount of water damage to your home in the process.
Any pipes that will be exposed to this weather that you can get to should be insulated in some way. You can do this by wrapping them in cloth or preferably a construction grade of insulation. A good amount of cloth will help in a pinch, though.
Inside your home, the pipes underneath the different sinks in the house can be kept warm by opening the cabinets so the heat in the house can get to them. Keeping a space heater near exposed pipes in your basement could also be a good idea, but use extreme caution when using space heaters, since they can catch on fire. You can use an extension cord with a space heater, but it needs to be a pretty heavy duty one and most homes do not keep extension cords as heavy duty as the kind needed around often. Place space heaters in your home very carefully and if possible, do not use them on carpeted surfaces.
You can also leave a trickle of water running out of the faucets when the temperatures outside get this low. It might add a little bit to the water bill, but it is only necessary to do this when the temperature gets below freezing, especially at night.
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