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Floods can happen for many reasons. If a water pipe breaks in your home, all the water will flow down and can leave your basement and other floors flooded and water damaged. Some rain storms come on so powerfully that they can cause rivers to overflow, or water to come in your basement windows, and worse. And if you have a sprinkler system installed, defects or hot air from burning something when you cook could cause it to go off.

Your newly renovated basement apartment or living room now looks like a hot mess, and it can be hard to know where to start repairing everything back to its original state. First, stay calm. Then follow these steps to ensure that you can get your home back to working order as quickly as possible.

Find the Source of the Flood

If your basement is suddenly wet, and there is no rain to be found, it’s critical to determine if it was a busted water heater, a burst pipe in the walls, or a leak on the foundation. Finding the source of the flooding can be tricky, but it can stop the water from causing any further damage. If you think it’s a pipe, the first thing you can do is turn off the water main to the house. This ensures no more water will get in from that source. If it’s from rain or local flooding, you may be able to use sandbags at the point of entry to reduce the amount of water coming in.

Remove the Water

The next step to flood mitigation is getting all the water out. You can use a good old-fashioned shop vac, but you’ll be working for a long time doing this. Restoration companies can come in and remove higher water levels more quickly with their equipment.

It’s important to find out if your homeowners’ insurance covers anything for this time of damage. Some companies have exclusions for flooding unless the water damage was caused by a certain type of flood. It’s important to find out what you’re working with as you start removing the water. It’s also important to get a hold of high-powered fans to try and get everything dry as soon as possible.

Get Funding for Remodeling

No one wants to have to remodel due to flood damage, but getting loans for it will help you get through the steps more quickly. Where can I get an emergency loan with bad credit? There are plenty of lenders out there who work with people even if their credit isn’t the greatest. Sometimes, you can even save money by ensuring you remove the water and dry everything out before mold can set in. This might mean you only need to remove a small portion of drywall, instead of taking everything out all the way to the ceiling.

Decide on a New Plan for the Space

Paying for the repairs might cost a bit of money on its own, but that doesn’t mean you can’t still plan on a great room renovation. There are home decorating apps that can help you in the process as well, which can be more fun after the heartache of dealing with major damage to your home.

Creating a plan can be as simple or as elaborate as you’d like and may even give you a chance to freshen up your space if needed. Adding new paint colors, new flooring, and maybe even new windows if they were the source of the leak can help refresh your home. If you can’t get funding for the entire plan, create different phases, with the ones that get your space functional as soon as possible being at the top of the priority list.

Dealing with damage to a home from flooding or a leak can be scary, overwhelming, and frustrating. But taking it one step at a time to determine how to get out of the mess will keep you from getting too far ahead of yourself. Finding the leak, stopping the water from coming in, then drying out the space are all at the top of the list of things to do. Thinking about how you renovate and decorate the space can come next.

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