Blog

How Drywall Finishers Can Help After a Flood

Date: June 19, 2018
Author: IUPAT Team
Categories: Blog, Drywall Finishing


Whether it’s your basement, your kitchen, your laundry room, or your bathroom, flooding in your house can cause a big mess. There can be a lot of work to do, depending on the severity of the flood. It’s important not to underestimate the potential damage to your home, especially to your walls! Drywall finishers can be a huge help in making sure that your house gets back to normal as quickly as possible.

Locate the source of the flooding

If the flooding is from a storm, you should wait until the rain has stopped before you start taking action. If the flooding is from a leak or a burst pipe, locate the source of the flooding as quickly as you can and shut off the water. Be careful! Watch out for sources of electricity as you are going to shut the water off, and don’t enter the room if you see sparks or signs of live electricity. Call the city or a professional who can help ensure your safety if you are in doubt.

Take pictures for insurance

You’ll want to make sure that you document the damage before you start cleaning up, so that you can submit an insurance claim. Replacing drywall can be costly along with the labour costs of hiring drywall finishers. You’ll also want to keep track of your receipts for any repairs so that they can be submitted with your claim.

Start by removing the water

This might sound like an obvious step, but you need to remove all of the water before any other repairs get started. Before you start the clean-up, you’ll want to put on rain boots and gloves to stay warm and protect yourself from any sharp or broken objects that may be under the water.  You’ll want to remove any furniture, rugs, and belongings, except for any electronics, which are best left to dry where they are. Any soft items like clothing should be washed before you dry them, and you’ll likely need to remove the baseboards in the room if you have them to get a clear understanding of the extent of the damage.

Watch out for mould

Water getting through the drywall can lead to mould growth that you can’t see. This is bad for your health and can lead to more damage to the house than the flooding initially caused. If you can, mark the high water line on your walls to make it easier for your drywall finishers to identify how much of your drywall might need replacing. You’ll also want to turn on fans or open windows if you can to help things to start drying out.

Remove any fixtures or things hanging on the walls.

Even if the water damage didn’t get close to fixtures like towel racks, paintings, or shelves, you’ll want to remove them so that they don’t get damaged when any drywall is being replaced. You can hang everything back up once any repairs are taken care of. Once all of this is taken care of, qualified drywall finishers can take care of removing the damaged drywall and replacing it.

Flooding in your home can be stressful enough, but follow these steps and contact a professional drywall finisher and your home will be back to normal in no time. And if you think that helping people get back to their everyday life after a really difficult day, contact us to learn more about a career as a drywall finisher!

June 19, 2018

How Drywall Finishers Can Help After a Flood

Whether it’s your basement, your kitchen, your laundry room, or your bathroom, flooding in your house can cause a big mess. There can be a lot of work to do, depending on the severity of the flood. It’s important not to underestimate the potential damage to your home, especially to your walls! Drywall finishers can be a huge help in making sure that your house gets back to normal as quickly as possible.

Locate the source of the flooding

If the flooding is from a storm, you should wait until the rain has stopped before you start taking action. If the flooding is from a leak or a burst pipe, locate the source of the flooding as quickly as you can and shut off the water. Be careful! Watch out for sources of electricity as you are going to shut the water off, and don’t enter the room if you see sparks or signs of live electricity. Call the city or a professional who can help ensure your safety if you are in doubt.

Take pictures for insurance

You’ll want to make sure that you document the damage before you start cleaning up, so that you can submit an insurance claim. Replacing drywall can be costly along with the labour costs of hiring drywall finishers. You’ll also want to keep track of your receipts for any repairs so that they can be submitted with your claim.

Start by removing the water

This might sound like an obvious step, but you need to remove all of the water before any other repairs get started. Before you start the clean-up, you’ll want to put on rain boots and gloves to stay warm and protect yourself from any sharp or broken objects that may be under the water.  You’ll want to remove any furniture, rugs, and belongings, except for any electronics, which are best left to dry where they are. Any soft items like clothing should be washed before you dry them, and you’ll likely need to remove the baseboards in the room if you have them to get a clear understanding of the extent of the damage.

Watch out for mould

Water getting through the drywall can lead to mould growth that you can’t see. This is bad for your health and can lead to more damage to the house than the flooding initially caused. If you can, mark the high water line on your walls to make it easier for your drywall finishers to identify how much of your drywall might need replacing. You’ll also want to turn on fans or open windows if you can to help things to start drying out.

Remove any fixtures or things hanging on the walls.

Even if the water damage didn’t get close to fixtures like towel racks, paintings, or shelves, you’ll want to remove them so that they don’t get damaged when any drywall is being replaced. You can hang everything back up once any repairs are taken care of. Once all of this is taken care of, qualified drywall finishers can take care of removing the damaged drywall and replacing it.

Flooding in your home can be stressful enough, but follow these steps and contact a professional drywall finisher and your home will be back to normal in no time. And if you think that helping people get back to their everyday life after a really difficult day, contact us to learn more about a career as a drywall finisher!

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