Avoid These Mistakes When Repairing Your Crawl Space

An alarming number of homeowners tend to forget that their home’s crawl space even exists, let alone take the steps necessary to ensure that it’s well-maintained. This can lead to a number of problems ranging from the accumulation of mold and musty smells to bug infestations and damage to your foundation. As you can imagine, these are situations that you want to avoid at all costs, but they’re bound to come up from time to time.

When your crawl space isn’t properly cared for or monitored, it will eventually need to be repaired. When such repair is necessary, it’s important that you do things the right way. Making a mistake can cause the problems to become worse than before, costing you time and money. To help you avoid this, we’ve compiled four common mistakes for you to avoid:

Adding More Vents

You may have been led to believe that adding more vents will reduce the amount of moisture in your crawl space, thereby lessening the need for repair in the future, not to mention the growth of mold and other such damage. This seems to make sense. After all, more vents will force moisture out of the crawl space… right? Well, the truth is, that when there’s a high level of humidity outside your home, the extra vents have a tendency to pull a lot more moisture into your home than they ever let out. Plus, more vents mean more ways for bugs to get inside.

Using Spray Foam Insulation

When used properly, spray foam insulation is an excellent way to reduce energy costs in your home. Crawl spaces, however, are a different story. If you use spray foam when repairing your home’s crawl space, you create a situation where mold, mildew, and wood rot is likely to occur. This is because your crawl space is a damp space and moisture can easily get trapped between the foam and the wall, creating the perfect environment for severe damage.

Skipping the Drainage System

When rainwater or groundwater enters your crawl space, the last thing you want is to allow it to sit there. Standing water can cause lasting damage to your home’s structure, along with all the other things we’ve previously mentioned like mold, mildew, and bugs. Some homeowners will let the water absorb into the water, which is obviously a horrible idea. When water enters your crawl space, it needs to have proper drainage in order to expel the water effectively and efficiently. If your crawl space is having issues with its drainage system, you definitely need to make sure you tend to it while repairing the crawl space.

The best way to ensure that your crawl space is well-maintained and repaired properly is to enlist the services of a professional cleanup crew. The experts at Abbotts Fire & Flood have many years of experience in repairing and cleaning up damage to your home in a variety of situations including water damage, fire damage, asbestos exposure, and much more. If you are in need of help, don’t hesitate to reach out today so that we can evaluate your situation and find a solution.