A wet basement is one of the most annoying things a home owner has to deal with. Regardless of whether they want to finish and furnish it, or they have chosen to leave it carpeted for storage of important home items; it is a nightmare when you take that flight of steps downstairs and step into a pool of water. Unless you are planning on having a miniature swimming pool down there, some work is needed to change the situation. Dry basements do not need to be expensive to have a professional come and make it a reality.
Basement Waterproofing Tips For Your Needs
With a few helpful basement waterproofing tips and a professional on your side, you can help create the dry basement that will be perfect for your precise needs.
The first helpful tip of basement waterproofing is to have a well-designed, good gutter system installed:
This is every home owner’s first line of defense. Some people claim that wet conditions in the basement are a result of a rising water table. This is a fallacy that should be completely done away with. What is true, though, is that the source of the water should be identified and the proper measures taken to stop that water from going into the basement. Oftentimes, the source of this water is water from the gutters. The roof covers the whole upper surface area of the house making it one large collector of water. If this water is not collected and properly directed away from the house, then there is bound to be moisture on the walls of the basement. A home owner should invest in a gutter system that collects all of the water and drains it further from the house walls, or better yet, collects it for use by the homestead.
Watch Video – How to Choose the Right Landscape Drainage System
The second helpful tip is to make sure you have proper landscaping of the soil around the house’s walls:
Soil design and management around the areas near the walls of the house is one area that causes a lot of seepage in the basements. Sloping of soil away from the house walls goes a long way to prevent rain water runoff from percolating along the house and basement walls. Sloping soil leads the rain water away to shallow trenches that can be placed in the compound to direct the runoff to the drainage system. The soil should at least slope six inches for the first three feet of the foundation walls. This would mean the water that actually seeps through the top soil layer to the lower levels of the foundation is reduced.
Watch Video – Choosing a Soil Mix
The final helpful tip is to ensure the use of quality waterproofing coatings:
This approach to basement waterproofing also makes the basement neat, clean, and have a nice ambiance. Waterproofing coating can prevent the passage of water, which comes under hydrostatic pressure. This specific type of paint is specially formulated for application on both interior and exterior surfaces. This type of coating should be differentiated from a water repellent coating, which is used to repel water but does not necessarily stop the entrance of moisture. Hydrostatic pressure prevented from this coating helps mostly against wind-driven rainfall and rain runoff that flows towards the foundation walls.
Watch Video – All paint-on waterproofing membranes are NOT created equal
You do not need to hire expensive contractors a bunch of times to sort out your wet basement issues. You just need to hire the right professionals from the start, and begin saving money right away.
