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| Checking Concrete Patio Slabs - Potential
Water Damage Problems |
| By Greg Vanden Berge |
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I really can't tell you how many times I've ran into problems with
concrete patio slabs that are higher than the interior floor of the
home. It doesn't have to be much higher, even if it's the same height,
you could still have problems if the patio slab doesn't slope safely
away from the home.
I lived in a house, that we were renting after our home burned down in a
fire. This house had just been remodeled and the owner had bought the
home to flip it and make some quick money as real estate prices had ran
out of control in that area.
I could tell that the owner of the home, didn't have much construction
experience and he must've hired some of the cheapest contractors and of
course sometimes when you hire the cheaper contractors, you're getting
inexperienced contractors and labor also. |
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I could tell that the concrete slab that ran the
entire length of the back of the house was a little bit higher than the
interior concrete floor slab. It's not hard to figure out. Simply go to
a window that is located near the concrete patio area that you're
worried about and measure up from the bottom of the window sill to the
interior flooring and then go outside and measure the distance from the
bottom of the window sill, to the top of the concrete patio floor slab.
If the measurement on the outside of the house is smaller than the
measurement on the inside of the house, that means that the concrete
patio is higher than the interior flooring. If the measurement is
larger, you probably won't have any water damage, the next time that it
rains.
If the concrete slab is higher, the next time that it rains, there's a
good chance that water could drain from the higher exterior concrete
patio slab into the home. If you live in a home with a problem like
this, you are probably going to need to remove the concrete slab and
lower it. |
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