OT: Flood Restoration
Anyone have any recommendations for flood restoration in Livonia / western Wayne county? I'm sure they're all slammed, but any insight on who is reliable / trustworthy would be appreciated.
Pics or it didn't happen.
they will have recommendations of who they have used in the past.
I worked for an insurance company. Disaster service companies would drop off their cards all the time because they know their client base usually calls us first. Our clients would always tell us what kind of job they did, and from then on out we recommended the companies that got the best client reviews.
Unfortunately flood from surface water is never covered under a homeowner's policy which a lot of people don't know. Flood insurance is handled by the government now. Usually the only thing you can get from your homeowner's policy is a back-up endorsement that covers water that specifically comes up through a sewer or drain.
Yeah, I figured I wasn't covered, but I gave it a shot. They did have a few recommendations though, so that was helpful. All of the water's gone now, but it seems like a mold fest waiting to happen.
I would still recommend calling a water extraction company. They have industrial strength dehumidifiers that can actually suck the water out of the walls/carpets to prevent mold. If they get to the area quick enough, sometimes the carpets can actually be saved. Mold unfortunately is another thing that is NEVER covered under homeowner's policies.
At work we've contracted with Coach's Catastrophe Cleaning out of Ypsi a few times. They've always done a good job and we've never had any complaints. Since they're an approved U of M vendor/contractor I assume some level of background checking was also done on them.
We had pipes break and dump raw sewage all over our lab and they did an excellent job cleaning it up.
GEWWW did the smell resonate? I assume it didnt since you mentioned they did a good job.
No, but the sound of screams permeated when it happened.
What type of damage are you dealing with? You could probably start the job yourself by tearing out the damaged portions of the drywall and allowing underneath to air out for a few days.
Not as bad as a lot of people got it. Just about an inch of standing water in about 1/3 of the basement. It's drained out now. Obviously the carpet has to go and probably the paneling walls. I don't know if getting rid of it all and drying is enough, or if I really need some sort of anti-microbial cleaning.
from a broken pipe. My insurance covered me but said I was NOT covered by rain water or backed up gutters. That falls under the Federal Governements Flood policy.
So before you call your insurance, you may want to read your policy. I bet you are NOT covered. I would never recommend this but I know some people cut into their water pipe and then make a claim.
Mold will grow 24 to 36 hours after humidity reaches about 70 to 75%. Get EVERYTHING that is wet out of the house. Then use a shop vac to get any standing water up. Go rent an industrial strength dehumidifier and a home use dehumidifier too. Run them FULL TILT.
Buy a new hygrometer. Dont trust one you alreay have. These are usually about $20 at HD. Get the humidity level below 50% NOW. Use fans to blow air around.
Do the work yourself if you have the time. Do not hire anyone. My insurance company wrote me a very large check during the inspection....no questions asked. I paid some friends to help me pull out carpet and wet dry wall then re-install new drywall. Then i put down a much better floor and I still had over $10K left over for a big screen TV, donation to UM, and a 6 pack of beer.
Good luck
We had a similar issue with our sump pump. Servpro came out and took out our carpet and set up dehumidifiers and fans for a few days. We are laying down some new carpet next and as we are a bit paranoid it may happen again, we are going pad-free (only padding the steps) and going with a burbur style. Servpro told us that if it ever happened again and we called them, they could extract the water immediately and not have mold issues (pending we call right away -- we were on vacation when this happened a few weeks ago).
We always had sump pump issues, so whenever we had a backup of water we would rent a couple industrial-like fans and let the basement air out, then scrub all of the surfaces with bleach. Never had a mold problem...
We had some water come up through the drain. We were quoted roughly $4,000 to fix the damage, so I hired a disaster mitigation consultant. For $100, he told me what I needed to do. had the carpet replaced in one room, the I ripped out some studs and drywall, and painted. So, for about $600 and two weekends, I did it myself.
I'm a teacher, so I have to often trade time for money...
Good luck to you
Yeah, I don't plan on actually purchasing a home for a long time, but there's no way I'd pay someone multiple thousands of dollars for a job like this. I'm fairly certain I could do a comparable job to what the "pros" would do for about 10% of what they would charge.
If you already haven't done so, contact your home insurance provider. We just had the same issue in our basement here in Grand Rapids, and our insurance agent (AAA) put us in touch with Arrow Restoration, a local home restoration place here. They said the minute the floors got hit (we had wood laminate flooring) those had to go due to moisture getting underneath and mold growth. The walls and ceiling (both drywall) were ok as my wife and I were able to affect cleanup immediately once the flooding started (our flooding was from a broken pipe). They did perform some general cleanup and antimicrobial cleanup on the drywall and that is still in good shape. They are in the process of replacing the floor this week. Insurance is covering the bulk of this all with only us chipping in our deductible.
Haha, we are under the same issue right now. We are using Servpro and they are doing an outstanding job. Painting is done and now carpet is next. For sure call your insurance company. We had sump pump coverage.
Jarvis Property Restoration out of Farmington. 1-866-4-jarvis. Solid company, been around over 30 years.
stateside restoration
248-310-5666
they are the best
they came out to my house 5 weeks ago
If you don't mind me asking, how much did your project run you? All of the water is gone now and I'm mainly just concerned with drying it out and preventing mold.
If you don't mind me asking, how much did your project run you? All of the water is gone now and I'm mainly just concerned with drying it out and preventing mold.
fans and de humidifier
drywall is cheap
you can rip the carpet up yourself to save a little cash
just get a razor blade to cut it up
If needed, and it's not reaching any sump pump, you can get a portable pump anywhere (Meijers even) for under $100. If it's just wet, and you have the carpeting up (my basement isn't finished, but gets microfracture leaks when really damp), you can mop it up, towel up the rest (I have a bag of old towels in the basement I just use to catch water, wash, dry, and repeat), then run the air in the basement (if it's finished and has heat/AC vents down there), and run fans to dry the damp spots when the towels sop up the excess. Then just use a healthy dose of pine sol type substance, liberally everywhere, and maybe treat twice to be sure. If it's just a drain overflow, maybe rooter it to make sure it flows well, but if it's coming from the foundation, before you put back up any drywall or siding, see if you can find what areas the cracks are coming from. There's instant dry lock cement at every hardware store, and you can just apply it yourself. It works for a few years, but it's a lot cheaper than having them dig new drainage ditches around your whole house. You can pretty much do the whole rim of your basement with one can.
Having said all this, I'm really not complaining about the flooding this year, because I'm just glad we're not getting the Tornados. What's happening south and west of us is really horrible, so tell yourself fixing a house is a lot better than having it disappear. That's what I'm doing when checking the basement for the 4th time in one evening.
You'll want to talk to John Walker at After the Flood Disaster Restoration - 734-476-1466 or 888-211-1270.
that they remove the padding from under the carpet and unless it was muddy/dirty water that stained the carpet, the carpet can actualy be kept, its the padding that molds not the carpet. The carpet may delaminate however. The padding under the carpet is where real mold problem is. You can roll up a rooms worth and carry out by yourself when its dry ,but once it gets wet it is a sponge increasing thier body weigth to a point where a area of padding that weighed 10 lbs before now weighs 70.
As for your walls water follows the easiest path, at the base of the wall on the inside is a natuarl pathway for water to flow easily as it is just concret there. The insulation backing usually soaks water up and can actually wick the water a few feet up your wall so make sure they are using sensors to see exactly how high the water has gone up. I'd call your ins. and just ask them who the suggest.
I am in the waterproofing buisness and have been for about 35 years. Most below grade waterproofing is designed to last around 20-25 years. The proper way to fix is to dig the exterior walls down to the footer and re-waterproof. If you have any questions I will give you my email so I can give you some solutions.
enough to have the rain break my car. My car is a beater and the threads on the gas capped have rusted out and the rust clogged the drain on my gas tank and it filled my tank with water. it was bad when i knew that i had a quater tank when i got to work and almost a half a tank when i left. ( tried to leave).