If your Basement is flooded, you need to know who to call. It’s a tough situation, and it can be frustrating when the water won’t stop coming up from the ground. You have two options: you can try to fix it yourself or contact a professional for the water damage restoration. This article will help walk you through what your next step should be.
I am an expert on flooding basements, and I’m here to help! In this post, I’ll go over all of the steps that you need for fixing a flooded basement, as well as some helpful tips if you want to do it on your own. If not, at least now you know who to call! So let’s start;
Here are three steps that I recommend for fixing a flooded basement.
Step 1 – Remove standing water.
Depending on how bad your flooding is, this step may be easy or difficult. Standing water can make the rest of your work much more difficult. If you can, always remove standing water because it’s better to be safe than sorry. Once the water is gone, you will have a better idea of what needs to be done and how much time and money it will take.
You should never try to pump out a flooded basement yourself because pumping out the water can lead to more problems. You need a professional pump, or you will do more harm than good. The only time you should try to pump out a flooded basement by yourself is if it’s a minor problem and your Basement is not under a lot of pressure from the outside. If the amount of standing water in your Basement isn’t too bad, you might be able to get away with pumping it out yourself. A good example would be if your sump pump failed and you had an inch or two of water in the Basement. On the other hand, if there is a lot of pressure against the exterior walls and your foundation, don’t try to fix it yourself.
Step 2 – Repair the water damage.
If you have standing water, you need to remove it before doing any other work. If your foundation is cracked or there are holes in your walls, this step becomes even more important. To properly dry out a basement after flooding, you need to repair all of these leaks first because they will make the drying process take much longer.
After you have fixed the foundation or any leaks that allow water into your Basement, you can start to dry out the Basement by pumping warm air in. The best way to do this is to run a dehumidifier down there because they will keep the air around 55% humidity and save your furniture.
However, you should keep the humidity below 65%, so mold doesn’t become a problem. Suppose you need to run the dehumidifier more than three days in a row to keep humidity at 65%. In that case, it’s probably time to contact a professional flood restoration company because this could indicate that there is more damage than you imagined.
Step 3 – Cleaning the area.
Once you get your Basement dry, it’s time to clean up all of the water damage that has happened. Mold isn’t something that you want in your house because it could lead to health problems in the future if left untreated. If you don’t have anything down in your Basement, feel free to throw it away, but if you do, you should try cleaning it with some soap and water.
The best way to get rid of the mold is to bleach the affected area, so use caution when doing this step. You don’t want to get bleach on anything else or let it soak into the ground outside because it could kill the grass. The best way to kill the mold is by spraying it with a mixture of vinegar and water (50/50).
If you’re finding that there is still some residual smell after bleaching, you might also need to use baking soda. If you can’t get rid of the smell, it’s time to call in a mold remover because the mold could grow inside the walls.
Cleaning up after a flood is not easy, and it can be very frustrating, but keep in mind that there’s always light at the end of the tunnel. If you have some problem areas, feel free to leave a comment below, and I will try to answer as soon as I can.
