Damage Prevention

Detecting Abnormalities

Many physical conditions can cause damage to your home, the personal property inside it—and even injure family members and guests. This can occur silently, without obvious indications and without drawing the attention of the inhabitants—until the damage is done.

Here are some common examples:

Accumulated water in a crawl space or basement (due to poor groundwater drainage or a plumbing leak) can lead to foundation problems, hardwood flooring buckling above, as well as mold, mildew, and fungus infestations.

Temperature extremes (both freezing and excess heat) in your cabin at the lake can cause burst water pipes, cracked windows and masonry, and other structural damage.

Abnormal high voltage spikes from the power pole at the street can damage appliances, lighting, and especially electronic equipment. See Safeguard Your Home Electronics [link]

Low voltage conditions (brown-outs) can damage air conditioning and refrigeration equipment.

Fluctuating voltages can cause digital electronic equipment to lose their configuration settings and behave erratically (providing, for example, sound but no picture, or picture with no sound).

Moisture conditions (under sinks, or tubs, for example) can damage cabinets, flooring, and underlying framing structures.

Solution

Simple moisture detectors and other monitoring systems can be integrated into a smart home security and/or automation system, then programed to alert the homeowner of developing conditions that—left unchecked—can result in cosmetic or even structural damage.

Detected early, these potentially destructive conditions can be remedied—before significant damage occurs. Monitoring for potentially damaging conditions can be especially useful in inaccessible areas like attics and crawl spaces, and for vacation homes which are visited infrequently (and where extreme weather can add to the damage.)

These kinds of conditions are usually simple to diagnose and inexpensive to remedy if they are detected early—before rot or other damaging conditions can take hold. Left unchecked, they can cause extensive damage that may be hazardous to the occupants, and expensive to repair—in rare cases even rendering the home uninhabitable.

Appropriate smart home integration makes it easy for you to monitor for these conditions, and receive timely alerts if they occur—so you can attend to them before they cause real damage.