Hi friends!
The other night I walked into my kid’s room and suddenly my socks were wet. I annoyingly asked my girls who spilled water? Crickets. Okay, I asked again.. “it was Ivy!“. Aria had no problem busting out her sister and Ivy just went ahead and took the wrap for it. Super irritated I made Ivy go to bed early and put a towel down to dry up the water. In the morning when I went to wake Ivy not only was the spot on the floor still wet but it had grown even bigger! Ivy couldn’t have possibly did this, I played back the video monitor and she was sleep. So what the heck was going on? At this point to annoyed, two pairs of socks later and too late for school we left the house. By the time we all got home later that evening, the entire bedroom carpet was soaked! What was going on?! What in the world was going on?!
Finally the next day our maintenance came out and by that time I had an idea of what might be going on. I was right our water heater had officially broken outside and slowly leaked into the girl’s room inside. Now what? what was next? what do we do? we had never had this happen before. Have you? Maybe you have and know what to do or maybe you haven’t and have no idea what’s next. Today I am helping you out so you don’t end up in the same position as me. So I give you 5 steps to take when your water heater breaks.
Step 1 Don’t ignore the signs: I still have no idea why Ivy fessed up to spilling water that night when it was actually the water heater. Either way, if I had taken the time to follow the water I would have noticed it actually was an entire trail of water leading to the wall outside where the water heater was. So don’t ignore the sign. If your floor is wet double-check the area around it. If the area is wet well you might have a broken water heater, my friend.
Step 2 Find a plumber: Finding a plumber and getting down to the bottom of it asap can be a huge deal. For us, we live in apartments so we were able to call up our maintenance who got the problem fixed within a few hours. Unluck though the damage was already done the room was soaked. Had we known sooner our maintenance could have called the plumber sooner. Water heaters can be repaired but worst-case scenarios they may also need to be completely replaced. It’s good to know right away.
Step 3 Dry the carpet: While the plumber was fixing the issue outside the maintenance was fixing the issue inside. He pulled up our carpet and brought in the biggest fan I had ever seen. For 48 hours the fan dried the floor. My husband and I took turns rotating it around the room to make sure every angle was covered.
Step 4 Check for mold: Usually when something like carpet gets wet nasty mold likes to make its self right at home. We were lucky we did not get any mold but just in case maintenance did check and sprayed the room as well to be safe. If you do end up with mold consult your plumber.
Step 5 Clean the carpet: After all, is done your carpet will have a not so nice smell. You will need to clean it. Once your carpet is dry and you are mold-free it’s time to clean your carpet. You can either hire professional carpet cleaners or you can do it yourself. I actually decided to do it myself. I poured baking soda all over the carpet, and let it sit 24-48 hours. I then vacuumed it up used a spray bottle and white vinegar to spray the carpet. Which by the way did smell but hey it got the job done to clean the carpet.
It’s been a week now and we were finally able to put all the girl’s stuff back into their room. They are so happy to have their room back and I am so happy to have all of their stuff out of my kitchen. Thankfully if this ever happens again I know exactly what steps to take. I hope this blog helps you, but I also hope your water heater doesn’t break. Trust me it’s no fun and it’s really wet.
