is your hard water causing your problems?

Posted on: 18 September 2015

If your home has become damaged in a flood, you will need to quickly get to work and clean up the mess. Once you have prevented any further water from flooding your home and removed the excess water, clean up any water-damaged items and deal with possible mold growth. Here are two tips to help make your flood clean-up an easier process.

Rent a Dumpster 

When you are cleaning up the inside and outside of your home after a flood, there are going to be a lot of damaged items and debris that you will need to dispose of. It can be helpful to rent an appropriately-sized dumpster from a local waste company to accommodate all the debris you need to throw away.

A representative with the waste company can help you estimate the size of dumpster you will need for the clean-up. Don't try to overfill your dumpster to save money. If you go over the waste company dumpster's weight limit, you can end up paying extra fees to the dumpster rental company. The reason for this is because the waste company pays the landfill a tipping charge according to the weight of the refuse they are dumping. 

As you decide which furniture items need to be thrown out and which ones can be saved, determine the value of any household items that have become damaged and wet from the flooding. Then, decide if it will cost more to clean, refinish, and reupholster an item or to replace the item with a new one. Upholstered furniture can absorb contaminants from the flood water and may need to be discarded. Also, some wood furniture can become warped from sitting in water and be damaged beyond repair.

Items such as mattresses cannot be salvaged after they have become wet in a flood and will need to be discarded. Mold can begin to grow in wet conditions within 24 hours. Because the interior of a mattress can not completely be dried out within 24 hours, it is best to toss it in the dumpster. Carpet padding cannot be dried within this time frame and should be discarded as well. 

Drywall that has become soaked needs also to be pulled out and discarded. Drywall contains gypsum and, when it gets wet, will pull in a great deal of moisture and hold it in. Then, when drywall does dry out, it will become crumbly to the touch, losing its strength. After cutting out any wet drywall, also pull out and throw away wet insulation batting. Once the air pockets inside insulation batting become full of moisture, the insulation loses its ability to effectively insulate your home.

Hire Mold Remediation Specialists

After a flood occurs in your home, it is important to remove the water and dry all wet surfaces as soon as possible to prevent mold growth. Some types of mold, such as black mold, can be dangerous to your health and cause many health issues from breathing in its spores.

When the mold covers more than ten square feet of area in your home, it is best to hire a mold remediation specialist to professionally and safely remove the mold from your home. If you try to clean up a large mold growth on your own, you can risk spreading the spores throughout your home and having further mold growth and health problems.

Mold remediation specialists first contain the area in your home where the mold is. This helps to prevent mold spores from becoming airborne and spreading to unaffected areas as they clean the moldy surfaces. The specialists can also use air filters to clean mold spores from the air in your home. 

Next, the mold specialists spray a biocide on the mold, which kills it. Chlorine bleach is not an EPA-approved biocide and is not the best product to use to remedy mold. Areas that cannot be cleaned with a biocide will be cut out, double-bagged, and taken out of your home. 

After the remediation has been completed, you can hire an environmental testing company to test the air in your home to make sure all the mold has been removed.

These two tips can help you clean up after a flood in your home.