Pipe burst, family room flooded, carpet likely ruined - options?

[Golf4food]

The main water line into our house popped an elbow and poured a few hundred gallons of water into our laundry room and family room Saturday morning, soaking the nice fluffy indoor carpet in the family room in the process and likely ruined it. We sucked up over 150 gallons with a few shop vacs and have fans running and spent much of today with the windows open, have a couple of buckets of DampRid open in the room, but the musty smell is pretty strong and the carpet is still quite soggy. It will probably need to be replaced.

We don't want more carpet in that room if we're ripping it out since it is a converted car port and so is lower than the laundry room (and rest of the house) and as such would collect any water from the laundry room, etc. Naturally this wasn't an expected expense.

Any recommendations for budget friendly replacement flooring? There is concrete underneath the carpet. We are thinking either a laminate or vinyl of some sort that wouldn't soak up water in the future, etc.

We also have no desire to the do the work ourselves since we need it done quickly and both work and aren't extremely handy people. Any expereince using Lowe's or Home Depot for installation of flooring?

 

[teresajoy]

The main water line into our house popped an elbow and poured a few hundred gallons of water into our laundry room and family room Saturday morning, soaking the nice fluffy indoor carpet in the family room in the process and likely ruined it. We sucked up over 150 gallons with a few shop vacs and have fans running and spent much of today with the windows open, have a couple of buckets of DampRid open in the room, but the musty smell is pretty strong and the carpet is still quite soggy. It will probably need to be replaced.

We don't want more carpet in that room if we're ripping it out since it is a converted car port and so is lower than the laundry room (and rest of the house) and as such would collect any water from the laundry room, etc. Naturally this wasn't an expected expense.

Any recommendations for budget friendly replacement flooring? There is concrete underneath the carpet. We are thinking either a laminate or vinyl of some sort that wouldn't soak up water in the future, etc.

We also have no desire to the do the work ourselves since we need it done quickly and both work and aren't extremely handy people. Any expereince using Lowe's or Home Depot for installation of flooring?

I don't have any suggestions for you, but will your homeowners insurance cover this? You might want to check with them.

 

[Golf4food]

I don't have any suggestions for you, but will your homeowners insurance cover this? You might want to check with them.

It would be covered if we wanted to shell out the $1,000 deductable. If it costs $1,000 to rip the carpet out of one room and put down a cheap floor then we'll just live with concrete, haha.

No sense calling the insurance for something that won't be more expensive than the deductable - it would just be an excuse for them to raise our homeowners rates! This is Florida, after all...

 

[goofyforlife]

FYI...

Laminates can get ruined by water too...

Vinyl would probably be a good option if you don't want concrete or maybe even just go with an area rug over painted concrete.

I've had good luck with Lowe's installs but i think YMMV depending on store location. I've read some horror stories here on the boards.

 

[littleteapot]

Did you get an estimate from a professional water extraction/carpet cleaning company? Since it was clean water, they probably can or could have saved it.

 

[Green Tea]

Are the walls concrete as well as the subfloor? If not, CALL the insurance company! Water will wick up the walls and cause big problems. The house will forever smell musty, mold can grow inside the walls. Water is just a huge problem.

I'd replace with ceramic tile. Water won't hurt it and it will hold a higher value than vinyl. I just had Lowe's install some flooring and they did a great job. You can also purchase tile from Lowes and hire your own ceramic installer if you want.

 

[Esmerelda]

If you can get the concrete totally free of carpet glue...Lowes and HD carry a garage coating epoxy that looks like a granite finish. It comes in numerous colors...and you can probably do it yourselves!

I know Behr makes it (I buy alot of Behr paint...its one of the best!).

Here is link to what I am referrring too...

http://www.behr.com/behrx/expert/floor_ext_index.jsp?subnav=exterior


hope that worked...maybe you could read up on it...it looks great on the floor!

best of luck,
Esmerelda <does a lot of home improvement....

 

[Jeanne B]

Are the walls concrete as well as the subfloor? If not, CALL the insurance company! Water will wick up the walls and cause big problems. The house will forever smell musty, mold can grow inside the walls. Water is just a huge problem.

Agreed. The pump on our dishwasher burst this winter when it froze up and we ended up having to replace our kitchen floor and living room carpet, in the end it cost around $4500 less our $1000 deductible. They also sent in a professional cleaning company to get everything dried out after we got the majority of the water out with a wet vac (and the cost of the cleaning company was on top of the $4500, we never saw that bill).

If you find you have to claim this on your insurance make sure you make a note of how many hours you spent getting the water out this weekend, that cost would be included in the insurance claim.

 

[NeedaVacation03]

Are the walls concrete as well as the subfloor? If not, CALL the insurance company! Water will wick up the walls and cause big problems. The house will forever smell musty, mold can grow inside the walls. Water is just a huge problem.

I would be very worried about the water in the walls if they are drywall. The carpet can be ripped up and replaced, but the stucture is a different story. I would call the insurance company ASAP, if you are not dealing with 100% concrete. Mold is nothing to mess with.
Previous poster is correct, keep track of your time cleaning you will get credit for that. Water is both friend and foe, good luck with your cleaning.

 

[mickeyfan2]

Did the sheetrock get wet. If it did you need to replace it. It will get moldy and cause illness.

 

[maggiew]

I can't imagine you really want just the concrete in the family room????? Even painted, etc. Is this where you hang out at all - watch TV, kids play, etc?? I sure wouldn't want to do that on concrete.

I think whatever you do is going to cost you at least $1000. So you might as well call the insurance company to play it safe with the mold issue.

Sorry for the trouble you are experiencing.

Maggie

 

[Golf4food]

I hadn't thought of the wood wicking up the water until ya'll mentioned it here - that's why I made the post - the Budget board is best.

It is a concrete block home, but the room that was flooded is the converted car port so two of the outside walls are wood, and there is wood panneling on the interior walls. We were so concerned about the carpet that we didn't even think about the wood.

We went to breakfast Sat a.m. and came home about an hour and a half later to find the leak, which I shut off immediately, and we began sucking up with a few Shop Vacs right away, so it didn't flood everything as badly as it could have - there were only a couple of small puddles and they weren't even 1/8 inch deep above the carpet yet, but the carpet is at least 1/2 inch tall and fluffy, so there was a good bit of water underneath.

Now the $10,000 question - anyone who had a similar experience find your homeowners rate go up as a result of the claim? How much?

 

[daughtersrus]

You mentioned that it got into your laundry room as well? What type of flooring do you have in there? It may need to be replaced as well. I agree that you should call your HO insurance. There may be damage to your walls, the furniture, appliances...that you are not aware of. I'm sure that you don't want to deal with mold in the future.

Do you have any plumbing work that needs to be fixed?

I'm not sure what the laws are in FL, but here we have what they call the "line of sight". For example, if the flooring in either rooms needs to be replaced and that flooring connects to other rooms, they would need to replace all of the flooring, not just the damaged part.

My opinion would be to call your agent.

 

[LizinSTL]

I hadn't thought of the wood wicking up the water until ya'll mentioned it here - that's why I made the post - the Budget board is best.

It is a concrete block home, but the room that was flooded is the converted car port so two of the outside walls are wood, and there is wood panneling on the interior walls. We were so concerned about the carpet that we didn't even think about the wood.

We went to breakfast Sat a.m. and came home about an hour and a half later to find the leak, which I shut off immediately, and we began sucking up with a few Shop Vacs right away, so it didn't flood everything as badly as it could have - there were only a couple of small puddles and they weren't even 1/8 inch deep above the carpet yet, but the carpet is at least 1/2 inch tall and fluffy, so there was a good bit of water underneath.

Now the $10,000 question - anyone who had a similar experience find your homeowners rate go up as a result of the claim? How much?

We filed a claim last year as a result of the storms that plowed through St. Louis (we had an oak tree fall and destroy the swing set and they also paid a claim to replace the garage door damaged by the storm) It was really a minimal claim, IMO- under $5k total damage less $1k ded. My insurance went up 20% this year. I imagine it'll rise another 20% next year. I'm shopping right now for a new carrier.

I agree with the pp who suggest the epoxy over concrete and then add some area rugs. Those are much easier to "dry out" in case of a water leak. We have carpet and ceramic tile in our basement but if we ever need to replace the carpeted side it'll be with more ceramic or the epoxy over concrete (money dependant).

 

[Golf4food]

We filed a claim last year as a result of the storms that plowed through St. Louis (we had an oak tree fall and destroy the swing set and they also paid a claim to replace the garage door damaged by the storm) It was really a minimal claim, IMO- under $5k total damage less $1k ded. My insurance went up 20% this year. I imagine it'll rise another 20% next year. I'm shopping right now for a new carrier.

I agree with the pp who suggest the epoxy over concrete and then add some area rugs. Those are much easier to "dry out" in case of a water leak. We have carpet and ceramic tile in our basement but if we ever need to replace the carpeted side it'll be with more ceramic or the epoxy over concrete (money dependant).

That is my fear. Insurance in Florida is already hard to come by - the major carriers won't write new policies on any homes built before 2004, so all that is left are the low end companies and Florida-specific subsidiaries that have high rates, limited coverage, etc. If they decide to raise our rates, we really have no other options. And if they drop us entirely then we are really screwed because nobody else would pick us up. A 20% increase in our insurance cost would probably force us to sell the house (which we just bought two months ago).

We really would prefer something "nice" looking in that room - it is where we spend all of our time when not sleeping. The computer is there, the TV is there, my keyboard is there, etc. So not having access to that room is a major inconvenience. It isn't like a Florida room or porch where it would look ok to have just anything on the floor. We "live" in this room and entertain friends and family in this room, so it really needs to not look like crap.

The laundry room is concrete base with vinyl floor we just put down two months ago from Lowes that seems to be ok. If anything we'd just need to pull up the corners and put down some fresh tape, but it seems fine. Since the top is slick most of the water came out of the pipe, right across the vinyl, and down into the family room at the doorway into the laundry room.

Anyone have some photos of a non-carpeted floor for a busy family room that looks decent to give us ideas? (I'm sure we'd put down some rugs to spice things up and provide non-cold feet space for walking, etc.)

 

[JennsBabySky]

We had a similiar situation twice in the last few years. The first time, we had major damage and had to use our home insurance (it ruined a huge chunk of our flooring and had one wall of drywall damage). The second time, we handled the claim ourselves, with the help of a company that specializes in waster repair. The second time, it cost us just over our deductible, but it didn't have any impact on our home insurance. The key for minimizing the damage is to repair it immediately -- before mold grows! The second time, the company had to pop all the bottom molding off the walls near the water, they cut small holes into the drywall and pulled out any water, then they put heavy duty fans directly blowing into the wall. For the carpet, they pulled out as much water as possible. Then we had to remove the padding and the wood that tacks down the carpet (it was beyond repair). More fans were used to completely (and quickly) dry the carpet and concrete. To repair the carpet, we just had to replace the padding and the wood strips. Even with the water damage company, it saved a TON of money by not needing to replace the carpet. For the drywall, we had to remove a small chunk that had mold in addition to the smaller pieces. Then it was repaired, repainted and the bottom molding was replaced. All in all it was about $1100 to repair.

Good luck,
Jennifer

 

[rockyroad]

Our house flooded due to an icemaker line breaking while on vacation.

The insurance came in and pulled out some of the carpet.
Some of it they saved and replaced the padding.

However, later the saved carpet became crunchy which meant it started to delaminate. They paid us for that carpet too, but we are actually still using it.

The flood caused a lot of humidity in the house and damaged the finish on my dining room table and chairs.

The good thing is that there was no damage to the walls.

I too would want ceramic tile.
But be sure to get some that will look good with dark grout.
Light colored grout looks really good for a short time and then never again!

If you are handy at all, Lowe's has a class in laying ceramic tile.
My brother has done almost his whole house himself and it looks good.

About concrete floors.
I have seen some really beautiful concrete floors.
But during our "Summer of the Flood" we had bare concrete floors for most of that summer. It was really kind of nice not to have to worry about spills and such.

 

[Princess Stitch]

I was lucky that the only time I had a room flood I was living in an apartment so there was no cost to us. All the advice I can offer is to get the walls and structure inspected by a professional company to make sure there will not be any long-term problems. Laying down a rug may save you money in the short term, but if this is not taken care of properly it could be a big problem in the future.

 

[SarahKate]

I agree w/ other posters that you really should think about contacting your insurance company. You don't have to file a claim right then and there - just give them a description of your problem and see what they say.

Keep air circulating in the room at ALL times. You have some moisture-"sucking" stuff in there already, but if you have a dehumidifier, put that in there now.

We have had some water in our basement a handful of times (over 6.5 years). It's never been standing water, just seepage that covers the entire floor. But even that amount can "creep" up the walls and cause wood to rot if it's not treated. Luckily we don't have sheetrock or anything like that. When it has happened, it DOES smell musty for a period of time. But if you keep the air flowing, it will get better and better.

If you can spend some time at home w/ the windows all opened, that will help too.

In our house, the moisture got upstairs also....so we had some areas we had to wipe up (where the moisture came in contact w/ grime and caused streaks).

The basement doesn't smell musty at ALL right now.

As for a solution - here is one: Carpet Squares!!! I have been in a few houses where they have these, and they look great. One friend got hers at the Habitat for Humanity "leftovers" store. They have a pattern on them, and she alternated them which gave a cool effect. So if it happens again (knock on wood), you can just pick them all up.

In our basement, we don't have any padding. It is just an industrial grade carpeting that can be pulled back and dried out. In the utility room, we have brown "grass carpet" which can also be pulled back.

I would stay away from vinyl because it could be damaged if water happens again. But a ceramic tile might be good - just make sure the grout is done RIGHT and there's no possible way for water to penetrate.

I think you have some good options. It SUCKS....but you'll get through it. Let us know how it goes.