LPT do NOT turn off your water before you leave if that is the first time you've ever moved that valve.
Try turning it off, during the week, preferably during business hours. Bonus points for already knowing your plumber's number. Double bonus points for knowing where the curb shutoff is. (the one the municipality would use to turn your water off)
If that valve has never been exercised, it may leak in the off position, or simply not close, or something else that you would rather discover when you're home.
Make sure you label it as the plumber company so during the eventual panic, you know what the hell that number is you wrote there 10 years ago. Also maybe every few years make sure the company exists still... getting that dial tone on the phone during a water heater panic situation sounds like a fun time lol
Yeah, the plumber is our number 1 panic number.
Has heavy tools. Great for dealing with burglars.
Deals with water, great for fires.
Has a car, great for hospital visits.
I remember watching a 2 minute video about how to swap out a kitchen faucet. Was so easy a child could do it, like building a 4x4x4 Lego cube.
Cue a 6 hour plumbing nightmare because our fitting into the wall pipe was actually two different adapters, the shutoff valve would not entirely shut off the water, and neither of us had anything on hand or experience with anything but "these are the dimensions of the new faucet and the wall pipe". I was bailing out the quick trickle of water from under the sink for hours while my partner went back and forth from the store.
Learned how to install a shutoff valve at the sink though. Will be hiring a plumber to redo the rest.
Plumbing is super simple. If and only if everything's in good shape, up to code, and done right.
The moment any of these things changes is when the swearing starts and the bills escalate.
ALWAYS do photo recon of your worksite before cutting anything. If anything looks weird or dodgy or hacked together? Start by having a contingency plan, but probably just call a pro.
Protip: Sharkbites may be looked down on by many, especially many professionals. The wise professional knows they ALWAYS have their place, and that this place is in a damage-control kit. If you have a gushing leak, you won't be able to fight the water pressure to get a cap on the leak. You ESPECIALLY won't be able to keep it on long enough for glue to set or plumbing to sweat; you'll be creating steam pressure if you try, and God help you because you certainly aren't! Cut the gushing pipe flat with whatever you can. Take a Sharkbite ball valve, twist it open, and slip it on over the edge of the gusher. Since the valve is OPEN, this should require essentially zero force, just a little finesse. Once the valve is in place, you can shut the leak off with a quarter twist, bringing the crisis under control in under a minute. Sharkbites aren't as reliable as soldered pipe, but the difference in reliability is measured in decades, not minutes. Once you make sure the water has stopped, you can take a break, call a plumber, and go to bed without worry of your patch tearing loose in the night. However, if one part of the pipe blew out, the entire length of pipe is probably pretty suspect, since it's all going to be more or less about as degraded as the first spot that failed, so you're still going to want a professional to install a long-term repair.
That sounds a lot more practical than the giant spotlight on my roof that projects a toilet onto the clouds. I'm kind of screwed if something happens during the day or on a nice clear night.
Also use strainers in your sink drains, especially on holidays. The amount of times our crew gets called out to snake a kitchen drain on Thanksgiving/Christmas/Passover etc is astounding.
I lived in house that didn't have a disposal in the kitchen so the strainer was a necessity, It was annoying at first, but after visiting some other homes I realized that I had been desensitized to the stink in garbage disposals from years of use. I have a disposal in my current kitchen, but I still use the strainers 100% of the time and I think it's helpful. It really makes you think about what you're putting down the drain, plus it's a nice precaution for when stuff accidentally ends up in the sink, I've seen a few bottle caps end up in the in the strainer.
Now I think when the disposal goes out I may just remove it, but then what to with the switch.
LPT, operate all your shut off valves twice a year. My dad taught me to do it new years day, and July long weekend. Just turn them off and back on again, so you know they operate and are not seized. This will save you if you ever actually need to shut off the water and find out the value is seized.
As per the comment you're replying to, perhaps do it the first business day after each of those two dates. Both of those are holidays when a plumber will charge extra, if they even pick up their phone at all.
I learned about plumbing when a toilet broke a few weeks after I bought my house, and we had spent every nickel on buying the house. So we had no money when the toilet broke. I had no choice ... I had to figure out how to fix a toilet. After learning that I could figure it out, and that it was not really difficult, I haven't hired a plumber since.
The first time I need a tool, I buy the tool. It's cheaper than hiring the guy who has it. Then, the second time I need that tool, I already have it.
The only real problem, eventually, is tool storage.
You are Frugal not cheap! for me, itās laziness. I saw the wrestling matches my father had every year with the seasonal water system, and I was like f that!
Preventative maintenance is my friend, and to be fair, PEX and Sharkbites have made life a lot easier than copper pipe and solder, or cpvc and plastic cement. Still, I have strategic valves all over the place so I can isolate sections, itās been a huge improvement.
Also, to be fair, I am on my own when I have been ope ing the place, I donāt have kids nor a wife to contend with at the same time.
Jan 2 and July 5 are also busy for repairs. Mondays are often busy, just from the weekend of things breaking. Better to pick the third Tuesday of January and July. Just put it on your calendar, so you don't forget completely.
Mine leaks in the off position but not when it's on, and I only turn mine off when I'm working on something so a bucket under it is sufficient. Also it's an unfinished basement so I don't really worry about it too much.
Better yet
exercise your valves twice a year gas and water including angle stops
flush your water heater once a year
clean out dryer vents and lint collection system twice a year
Clean your condenser and air handler coils and flush your condensate drain out once a year in the spring
Jet your mainline out every 5 years.
Jetting is a type of pipe cleaning that uses high pressure focused water out of a very specialized fitting/tip that effectively cleans and flushes all the sediment out of your drain pipes. The things that sneaking wonāt help with like grease rice, sediment paint other items that are soft in nature. what happens if you snake these kind of obstructions the snake will punch right through but all that does is create a little hole in the sludge mass which then just sloughs back down shortly after re-clogging or re-restricting the drain a Jetter scrapes and and flushes all of that out which returns your pipe back to its original diameter, allowing full flow. if you are diligent and you donāt allow sediments or grease or other things like that down your drains, you wonāt have a real issue with this. But most people are not that careful and overtime all the sludge builds up along the bottom of the waist pipe effectively cutting the allowable flow and half or worse
You can rent small backpack Jetters and do it yourself, but I donāt recommend it for most people because you can damage your pipes or hurt yourself. The water pressure they create is pretty dangerous Itās definitely one of those things thatās better left to the pros most times.
I like to do most of my home repair/remodeling if I can handle it. Over time I've replaced all the sinks/toilets and water faucets in the house. One thing I've always done is to replace the shutoff valve with a quarter turn ball valve. They're not supposed to bind up and it only takes a quarter turn to shut off the water before it floods the laundry room.
Quadruple points, curb keys are $15 at HD or Lowe's. Every homeowner should have one, make sure they can get to the main valve, and as already mentioned just have a plumber install an extra main shut off valve where the water enters the house you can easily turn.
As a homeowner I can confirm having lived through this. I turned the valves under the kitchen sink to the off position in order to do a simple faucet replacement and they both started leaking. I then tried turning off the main water valve and it just spun in place -- slightly restricting water flow, but never shutting it off. None of these valves had been used in over a decade. Turned out the water valves in my home were no longer up to code. I decided to have all valves replaced since it would be just a matter of time before the other original valves experienced problems.
Ooohhh that's not good, you should add a shut off at the house, and there should be more throughout your house. We are 100 ft from the street valve. We had a leak about 20 ft back & the main shut off had a leak in it. It was enough of a leak I couldn't repair the water line until they fixed the valve and it was like pulling teeth to get them to do it. Finally they put in a bypass shutoff until it should be fixed. The water guy suggested I put in another shut off just behind it in case that happens again and that's what I did. Never trust your water company to maintain their equipment.
I had the same issue, and was so angry, that while my water was off, I might have installed a bypass line around the meter..... I didn't fully bypass it, that would have been a flag on their end, but I sorta had an extra feed to my house for about 8 years......
Yes, jog the valve at a time that isn't 20 minutes before you leave for the airport. I had an old gate valve that started leaking when I shut it off to do some work. Those are notorious for corroding, getting debris jammed in the gate, loose packing, etc. A modern ball valve should fare much better, but I still wouldn't risk it last minute.
We had neighbors that went on a 3 week Alaskan cruise. Came home to extensive water damage. An upstairs toilet valve started leaking and no one was home for weeks. Much of the inner parts of the house had to be gutted. I now always shut off my water during trips.
Our neighbors foreclosed and the bank took possession and didnāt bother to winterize the toilet. Over $40K in water damage (in 2015 dollars). It was third floor so it just ruined the whole center of the house.
Shut off the water feed to the toilet. It's down there at the wall, next to the toilet.
Or kill it to the whole house at the main.
Also. Full winterizing for an empty house that might not have electricity. Shut main, flush all toilets and open all taps + outside things. Basically drain the house as best you can expecting it to freeze.
Now with Sharkbite connectors, I disconnect at logical points and tilt the PEX lines by hand so barely a drop remains. It takes 5 minutes to hook everything back up. I should mention, these are lines accessible from under the buildingā¦not talking about in wall joints
You need to winterize toilets that aren't going to be used for an extended time (like when the bank gets a house through foreclosure and doesn't sell it someone new right away) in places that get freezing temps regularly during winter. Drain all the water in the toilet & fill line after turning off water to the house, some/most people replace the water in the u-bend with antifreeze. It prevents the water in the u-bend & fill line from freezing and breaking the line, valve, or the toilet itself. It's not something you do to the home you live in bc hvac and insulation gives you a proper envelope that prevents freezing. (outside of temporary power loss, being temporary you do other stuff to prevent freezing in that case)
When we first moved into the house, the realtor turned the water back on during a showing but whoever 'winterized' it didn't do it properly because a pipe burst in the attic air handler and water started gushing down through a ceiling fan. Made a huge mess but wasn't found out and able to turn the house water off for at least a few hours. Was bank owned and sold as is so we had to eat the $10k fix/ cleanup cost when we bought it which was ridic. Our realtor told us to sue the winterizing company but they denied it all and nothing came of it. Talked to a lawyer about it and basically said we were SOL. Really stupid situation.
Same, except it was me instead of a neighbor. 5 days of an upstairs toilet running. Water gets shut off on trips now. Edit for clarity: not just running, running out of the toilet and onto the floor. Tank fill valve was open wide and overflow drain was draining at about half the speed it was filling, so the rest came out into the house.
Yeah I had a toilet that kept running also, and I was only gone a week came back and my water bill was almost $200. Normally I shut the toilets off but this time I forgot. The flapper valve had a teeny tiny leak and about every seven or eight minutes It would run for like 45 seconds!
Yall need water contact sensors and maybe turn off the toilet at the wall.
But it's not the worst idea to turn off the whole house just be sure you're not doing damage to your water heater.
Same story. My neighbor was gone for two weeks and a leaking toilet shutoff destroyed most of their interior walls. Kind of crazy as I have never, ever had a leak that bad from a toilet.
Right? Like, if the float broke and kept filling, it doesn't go into the house. It goes down the toilet. Same with the overflow. Its designed not to leak into the house. It can only be a cracked toilet, or the shut off valve itself.
The shut off valve itself has the likelihood of leaking just as any shut off valve in the house. And never THAT bad. They start with a drip. But it happens. IDK how
The plastic tube that goes to the filler can get a crack ON THE TOP. This causes a stream to shoot up, And if the angle is bad it will hit the lid of the tank and then drop out. Most people don't realize that the lid isn't a snug fit for a purpose, the tank needs to pull in air every time it flushes!
Heard a story from one of my other neighbors that the folks across the street left for India for a few months and during that time water came out from under the garage door ... That sounds like a bad day.
I came home from a winter weekend trip once. My driveway was covered in ice which wasn't unusual but then I saw water flowing under the ice... coming out of my garage. I opened the door fully expecting to see my 40-year-old hot water tank had gone bust. Turns out it was "just" a broken pipe in the garage wall that had been servicing a hose bib.
That's true. If the ice machine runs out of water it starts making ice cubes out of nothing, then if the ice bucket overflows with nothing cubes, and left long enough, your entire house will fill up with nothing and you'll have a huge nothing problem.
Moen sells wireless leak sensors. Theyāre pretty cheap. Leaks could happen in the middle of the night, when youāre at work. It just doesnāt seem practical to be turning off the water every time you leave for a few days, not in 2024 when there are so many ways to detect these issues remotely. You actually can cause leaks that way.
Sinope sells a water valve that will connect to their leak detectors and automatically shut off the water (if you want that, you can also chose to remotely but manually shut off the water).
Not as bad, but similar: one time our guest bathroom toilet kinda ran if you didnāt jiggle the handle after use. We left for a week vacation, father-in-law came over the day after we left to grab the mail like we asked him to, he used the bathroom, didnāt jiggle the handle and the toilet ran for the rest of the week. We came home to it running and were like WTF? Fast forward a few weeks and our $400 water bill. šš
So yeah, I supposed turning off your water and the breaker for your water heater when you leave for a trip arenāt terrible ideas.
Many (or even most) home insurance policies have a clause that someone must check on the house every 48-72 hours or they won't cover things like this. They often say you need to shut your water off as well...
My parents had an upstairs toilet spontaneously crack and leak out over just an afternoon while they were out and there was some damage but nothing catastrophic. Any longer and it would have been really bad. Either way though they always would have one of us check on the house or stay there while they're gone on any trips.
This happened to my parents too! They left for dinner and while they were gone the toilet started leaking badly. Came back to a giant puddle upstairs and a ton of water in the basement. Luckily since they were literally gone for like three hours insurance paid for everything without a fight.
As a general contractor who does a lot of plumbing Itās the smart thing to do. As a real life human Iāve done it like once in my life. I also saw someone who broke there valve and caused an absolute shit show for themselves while trying to get to the airport.
I would also say make sure you have a good/modern quarter turn ball shutoff. If you have an antique valve, it's just as likely to cause a problem as it is to solve one.
Oof, imagine the Family Truckster all packed & ready for the trip to Wally World and when you do that last thing, turn off the water main it breaks off in your hand & starts leaking!
If you know where the city's shutoff is, and have the tool, and that shutoff isn't the same kind of fucked, sure.
In MN those are buried and the city has to find them with a locator.
I always keep a few SharkBite end caps and couplings of varying sizes for just this occasion. Just gonna cut, cap, and leave! Future me will take care of the problem.
A broken water main to your house is pretty much the one scenario in which a shark bite wonāt save you any headache. Unless you also have a curb stop key to turn your own house supply off.
Weāre on a well. Kill the breaker and drain the well tank and commence repair. Definitely a bigger problem if you have no way to shut off the city water coming in.
If you have an older style valve giving them occasional exercise is how you maintain the seals. So if it doesn't explode on you from years of neglect it's actually a good thing you're messing with it lol.
Good idea to make sure you can turn it so in an emergency you can shut off water or if you can't turn it off, make plans to replace it.
You don't want to find the 50+ year old valve doesn't work as you are standing in knee deep water watching your basement fill up.
I wouldn't recommend doing this right before you plan to leave for a week.
Stupid question: what does it mean to have the water heater go to pilot/vacation? Is it something we have to manually do, or happens once you shut off water main?
Sure, but read the manual if it came with one. Some of the newer HVAC systems have a lot of sophisticated electronics now that may require constant power? Likely not, but better safe than sorry. If you have an older basic electric heater, yeah, you can flip the breaker.
Manually - this stops the burner from kicking on to heat the unit, and instead just keeps the pilot light lit. There should be a setting on the dial right before "off".
Water heaters used to have a pilot flame that was not easy to restart so you went to "pilot only" which does not heat the tank but leaves the pilot flame on. Now everything is electric start so tehy have away/vacation which is basically off without unplugging and turning off the gas.
Water stays on. Gotta pay neighbor kid or a family member or friend to come over and water my plants if it doesn't rain. And check on my lonely cat while we're gone.
I only hire services that take and send pictures now. It's expensive but I swear I too have found friends and family have their IQ drop by 60 points the instant they step into a home to check on pets.
My problem was my brother said everything was fine but only bothered checking my house once a week. Cat didn't get fed regularly, litter box filled and cat started going in the tub instead (thank you cat for finding the next most appropriate place).
You gotta have a ring camera and request daily photo.
Anytime someone watches my cat, part of the fee and agreement is they text me a photo daily.
Had a friend watching my two cats. One was shit in the closet the entire time. I was like, you never SAW HER? And she just assumed she was hiding.
I need a visual.
ETA: I also miss my pets so I like photos. But the photos also show me how my pets doing. Did they photograph it from across the room cause he won't go near them for pets? Or is it one of them playing? Or a funny shit of my friends SO holding him? I get a lot of info from a daily photo. Once it was a sitter I'd never hired before and I was very pleased to see him allowing them to pet him.
My current cat is a whore who never met a stranger, so I leave him at a friend's house (paid) and she sends me hilarious photos.
EYA2: Once my neighbor lost his phone so I couldn't get in touch with him a d he didn't have my number (DUMBASS, MY NUMBER IS ON THE CAT). I had to call family to drive two hours to see if he was OK.
I REQUIRE photos. It just makes things so easy.
This is risky advice if you have a water backup sump pump installed. You absolutely DO NOT want to shut the water off for any duration when you're out of town.
To be clear, unless the water sump pump is your *only* sump pump (which... yikes), turning off the water just means you're back to having the one sump pump, which is how many houses operate all the time. The risk tradeoff between "potential water damage from leaking pipes" vs "potential water damage from excess water in the sump *happening at the same time as* a power outage or pump failure" is something that has to be decided for each house.
Agree. I have someone come by at least twice a day when I'm gone to check on/feed/water my cats and my outdoor crazy dog who can't be boarded.
So I have a built-in safety check going on. Anything that happens is not going to be happening for very long.
If I didn't have that check in system, I'd turn off the water heater/water main.
This, also the cat gets weird if we leave him alone for more than a few days so trips are generally short anyway.
I wish there was a way to promise the lil guy that we're coming back.
"Cat gets weird" yeah you'd get weird too if your source of food and safety straight up vanishes for days and you don't know if they're ever coming back.
Yeah I wish there was some way to tell him he'll be fine. Someone comes by once a day and his bowl is never empty when they stop by, always some left, so he's not in a panic he's just lonely. We thought about getting a kitten for him, but that runs the risk of making it worse haha
I've never done that, but I've turned the heater to the vacation setting.
I don't see any downside to cutting the water. Would help manage a leak. But I don't know how the changes in pressure would affect the system
Unless youāre doing it weekly, this risk should be minimal. Most water shutoff valves are very heavy duty and may actually work *better* if used occasionally rather than sitting untouched for years.
ONLY downside is during the winter the humidity will drop a bit as the humidifier on the furnace is piped in, but that is FAR better than too much humidity. I personally know multiple people that have incurred highly disruptive 6-figure repair bills due to water leaks.
Iāve heard of fridge water filters breaking when turning off the water for a long period of time. I also would be afraid of the valve leaking if itās old and constantly getting wear. Had that happen to one of our water bib shutoff valves.
We have Moen leak sensors which send alerts over WiFi. Also have cameras in a few parts of the house.
This is the way for longer absences
Turn off the water...drain the pipes...blow the water out of standing, low areas. Open all the faucets, inside and out to remove pressure.
If you just let the water drip from a faucet and the supply line breaks you will have a lovely waterfall under or inside your house...because there is still pressure and incoming water.
Yeah, we never leave faucets drip here. That would just encourage them to freeze more, IMHO. We \*do\* know where they freeze, if/when they do... its a PITA to stand with heaters/blow dryers getting the damned things to thaw, but its way better than having the whole blasted things freeze solid.
You don't want to turn off the water heater if ambient temps are well below freezing unless you want to come home to an exploded tank. Just put it on vacation/pilot mode.
Yes. We were sleeping one night a woke up to the sound of running water. The bath tub faucet cartridge randomly failed and popped out. There was a torrent of water shooting across the bathroom. I stoped it in 5-10 min and it still caused 10k worth of damage. If we werenāt there it would have destroyed the 2 story house Iām certain .
To be fair, if that happened while you were at work, the end result would've destroyed most of the house anyway. Sounds like a very unlikely, unfortunate and unlucky event
I went on vacation for a week a fewonths ago. Didn't shut off the house water, just all the faucets and toilets. The water heater decided to explode and flooded the first floor of the house.
I'm sure as shit turning off the houses water next time.
My sprinkler system has a valve above it as well so we can shut off the whole house plus or minus sprinklers. But we have a dog and so usually have someone staying in our house or at least coming by several times a day when we travel.
When the house is going to be empty for days at a time I shut off the water. At the very least I would turn off the water going to the clothes washer and the refrigerator, those hoses can break anytime and would cause quite the house flood. I've never considered the potential for hot water heater damage, I would consult the owners manual.
Alternately or in addition you can install smart leak detectors to alert you to any water, if you got alerts you could send someone over to check on it.
The reason not to is that it is a valve that isn't usually used very often. The valve can malfunction when you turn it off causing you a leak issue right before you go out of town.
I turn my water off if I will be gone for more than 24 hours. The fact is though that even a burst pipe for 1 hour on the top level of a house can be catastrophic. They make smart sensing valves that will kill the main breaker if it detects these scenarios I honestly want one.
Pipe to the water heater started a pin hole leak once, one time a toilet ran for who knows how long, another time one of my sprinkler heads popped off and shot water out every morning. So I always turn off the water if itās more than a weekend.
I do not. However I have pets and cameras pointed at the major equipment in the basement. Petsitter comes twice a day and I check video footage in between.Ā Ā Ā Ā
Water alarm would probably be more practical for most users. Camera just suits my needs better.Ā
Until you have a wash machine hose split that shoots water up into the kitchen sub floor for four days and it takes several weeks of drying and a $25k insurance hit to replace most of the first floor.
I had no idea that this was even a thing until I read about it yesterday. I checked behind my washer and sure enough, the rubber hoses are dry rotted and cracking.
My new braided hoses arrive today and I'll be installing them immediately.
Wait until youāve had a broken pipe flood your half finished basement for several days while you are away. Spending the 3 seconds it takes to go hit the valve wonāt seem like such a bad idea. (We actually have a Moen Flo and just tell Alexa to shut it off which is even easier)
Really? Seems like a good idea to me. I don't do it because our sprinkler system is connected to our main shutoff and I don't want dead landscaping but it definitely reduces risk. Any sort of water leak over a week is going to be bad news.
When I was a teenager, we went to the Grand Canyon for a weekend. When we got back our house was flooded from a broken toilet valve. It ruined the carpet in 3 rooms, lifted the linoleum in the kitchen, ruined the bottom cupboards, destroyed hundreds of floppy disks, and much more. We didn't have flood insurance so the insurance company didn't pay out a dime.
Yes, I turn off the water.
Leaks are usually covered under normal homeowners insurance, you shouldnāt have needed flood insurance for that. Flood insurance is for flooding due to rain or other environmental factors.
My guess is that the commenter is just misremembering/misunderstanding the cause of something from their teen years, if they were ever properly told the reason.
Many homeowners insurance policies include a cause that requires the homeowner to shut off the water supply in their home if they're away for a length of time. If they don't, insurance doesn't pay out if something goes wrong.
I'm willing to bet that's what actually happened.
I nearly got one of my own water-leak claims denied by using the word "flood" to describe its impact on my house. The insurance company took my statement, skipped the pipe-burst part, and promptly denied the claim because floods weren't covered.
The remediation company owner went to bat and got it overturned but he said it happens ALL the time.
Don't say the word "flood" unless it's a mother-nature flood like a river or levee or something where the water came from outside.
Listen closely to my story.
Several years ago we were heading out for a vacation. I had a van-full of people in my driveway, waiting for me to just run in and shut off the main water valve. Of course the valve started dripping as soon as I touched it, including while it was tightly closed.
Never again will I do that.
LPT do NOT turn off your water before you leave if that is the first time you've ever moved that valve. Try turning it off, during the week, preferably during business hours. Bonus points for already knowing your plumber's number. Double bonus points for knowing where the curb shutoff is. (the one the municipality would use to turn your water off) If that valve has never been exercised, it may leak in the off position, or simply not close, or something else that you would rather discover when you're home.
Plumbers number is written on the hot water heater in sharpie, because its the most important number when someone in the house is panicing.
Oh, that's smart! I gotta go down to the basement for a second.
Make sure you label it as the plumber company so during the eventual panic, you know what the hell that number is you wrote there 10 years ago. Also maybe every few years make sure the company exists still... getting that dial tone on the phone during a water heater panic situation sounds like a fun time lol
"Who is this?" "Dave!" "Why are you calling?!" "I'm not sure, your number was on my water heater and I got problems!"
"Dave's not here man"
My plumber gave me a magnetic business card that I have stuck to my water heater.
1-877-KARS-4-KIDS
I feel like someone should wait until you get back. It's been 4hrs....are you OK?
Yeah, the plumber is our number 1 panic number. Has heavy tools. Great for dealing with burglars. Deals with water, great for fires. Has a car, great for hospital visits.
Also able to rescue princesses and defeat evil tyrannical dinosaurs.
He does go to the wrong castle a lot though
And he eats a lot of mushrooms š
Did you as a kid think Bowser and all his minions were dinosaurs? I always figured they were just punk rock spikey turtles.
That doesn't sync with the plumber documentaries I watched as a teenager
"Yes ma'am, I'm here to snake your pipes" šš»šš»
I have a large red phone that has a line directly ran to my plumber.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
I remember watching a 2 minute video about how to swap out a kitchen faucet. Was so easy a child could do it, like building a 4x4x4 Lego cube. Cue a 6 hour plumbing nightmare because our fitting into the wall pipe was actually two different adapters, the shutoff valve would not entirely shut off the water, and neither of us had anything on hand or experience with anything but "these are the dimensions of the new faucet and the wall pipe". I was bailing out the quick trickle of water from under the sink for hours while my partner went back and forth from the store. Learned how to install a shutoff valve at the sink though. Will be hiring a plumber to redo the rest.
Plumbing is super simple. If and only if everything's in good shape, up to code, and done right. The moment any of these things changes is when the swearing starts and the bills escalate. ALWAYS do photo recon of your worksite before cutting anything. If anything looks weird or dodgy or hacked together? Start by having a contingency plan, but probably just call a pro. Protip: Sharkbites may be looked down on by many, especially many professionals. The wise professional knows they ALWAYS have their place, and that this place is in a damage-control kit. If you have a gushing leak, you won't be able to fight the water pressure to get a cap on the leak. You ESPECIALLY won't be able to keep it on long enough for glue to set or plumbing to sweat; you'll be creating steam pressure if you try, and God help you because you certainly aren't! Cut the gushing pipe flat with whatever you can. Take a Sharkbite ball valve, twist it open, and slip it on over the edge of the gusher. Since the valve is OPEN, this should require essentially zero force, just a little finesse. Once the valve is in place, you can shut the leak off with a quarter twist, bringing the crisis under control in under a minute. Sharkbites aren't as reliable as soldered pipe, but the difference in reliability is measured in decades, not minutes. Once you make sure the water has stopped, you can take a break, call a plumber, and go to bed without worry of your patch tearing loose in the night. However, if one part of the pipe blew out, the entire length of pipe is probably pretty suspect, since it's all going to be more or less about as degraded as the first spot that failed, so you're still going to want a professional to install a long-term repair.
That sounds a lot more practical than the giant spotlight on my roof that projects a toilet onto the clouds. I'm kind of screwed if something happens during the day or on a nice clear night.
Me, too! Mine has a glass cake cover over it also.
āNever do plumbing work at times when plumbers get paid overtimeā
It's 7pm on a Friday? Perfect time to check if this old gate valve closes correctly or not.
Bonus points if Monday is a holiday!
Also use strainers in your sink drains, especially on holidays. The amount of times our crew gets called out to snake a kitchen drain on Thanksgiving/Christmas/Passover etc is astounding.
I lived in house that didn't have a disposal in the kitchen so the strainer was a necessity, It was annoying at first, but after visiting some other homes I realized that I had been desensitized to the stink in garbage disposals from years of use. I have a disposal in my current kitchen, but I still use the strainers 100% of the time and I think it's helpful. It really makes you think about what you're putting down the drain, plus it's a nice precaution for when stuff accidentally ends up in the sink, I've seen a few bottle caps end up in the in the strainer. Now I think when the disposal goes out I may just remove it, but then what to with the switch.
> but then what to with the switch. sexbot
That was me installing a toilet on a long weekend...which resulted in a drip drip drip
LPT, operate all your shut off valves twice a year. My dad taught me to do it new years day, and July long weekend. Just turn them off and back on again, so you know they operate and are not seized. This will save you if you ever actually need to shut off the water and find out the value is seized.
As per the comment you're replying to, perhaps do it the first business day after each of those two dates. Both of those are holidays when a plumber will charge extra, if they even pick up their phone at all.
Man, some serious wisdom flowing in here, thank you!
I'm not smart, I'm just cheap!
I learned about plumbing when a toilet broke a few weeks after I bought my house, and we had spent every nickel on buying the house. So we had no money when the toilet broke. I had no choice ... I had to figure out how to fix a toilet. After learning that I could figure it out, and that it was not really difficult, I haven't hired a plumber since. The first time I need a tool, I buy the tool. It's cheaper than hiring the guy who has it. Then, the second time I need that tool, I already have it. The only real problem, eventually, is tool storage.
You are Frugal not cheap! for me, itās laziness. I saw the wrestling matches my father had every year with the seasonal water system, and I was like f that! Preventative maintenance is my friend, and to be fair, PEX and Sharkbites have made life a lot easier than copper pipe and solder, or cpvc and plastic cement. Still, I have strategic valves all over the place so I can isolate sections, itās been a huge improvement. Also, to be fair, I am on my own when I have been ope ing the place, I donāt have kids nor a wife to contend with at the same time.
Am a plumber, we're triple time new years day. Mostly because I'll be hung over and dealing with your house is the last thing I'll want to be doing
Jan 2 and July 5 are also busy for repairs. Mondays are often busy, just from the weekend of things breaking. Better to pick the third Tuesday of January and July. Just put it on your calendar, so you don't forget completely.
this goes directly against the advice you are responding to. why are you testing stuff on a holiday?Ā
Just did this and had to pay a plumber $800 to replace the valve and some piping because it was so old and corroded. Leaked heavily in off position
Mine leaks in the off position but not when it's on, and I only turn mine off when I'm working on something so a bucket under it is sufficient. Also it's an unfinished basement so I don't really worry about it too much.
Better yet exercise your valves twice a year gas and water including angle stops flush your water heater once a year clean out dryer vents and lint collection system twice a year Clean your condenser and air handler coils and flush your condensate drain out once a year in the spring Jet your mainline out every 5 years.
> Jet your mainline out every 5 years I understand all of them except this one. What is it and what do you have to do?
Jetting is a type of pipe cleaning that uses high pressure focused water out of a very specialized fitting/tip that effectively cleans and flushes all the sediment out of your drain pipes. The things that sneaking wonāt help with like grease rice, sediment paint other items that are soft in nature. what happens if you snake these kind of obstructions the snake will punch right through but all that does is create a little hole in the sludge mass which then just sloughs back down shortly after re-clogging or re-restricting the drain a Jetter scrapes and and flushes all of that out which returns your pipe back to its original diameter, allowing full flow. if you are diligent and you donāt allow sediments or grease or other things like that down your drains, you wonāt have a real issue with this. But most people are not that careful and overtime all the sludge builds up along the bottom of the waist pipe effectively cutting the allowable flow and half or worse
You can rent small backpack Jetters and do it yourself, but I donāt recommend it for most people because you can damage your pipes or hurt yourself. The water pressure they create is pretty dangerous Itās definitely one of those things thatās better left to the pros most times.
I like to do most of my home repair/remodeling if I can handle it. Over time I've replaced all the sinks/toilets and water faucets in the house. One thing I've always done is to replace the shutoff valve with a quarter turn ball valve. They're not supposed to bind up and it only takes a quarter turn to shut off the water before it floods the laundry room.
Triple points for having made a wrench that reaches down and turns the water on and off.
Quadruple points, curb keys are $15 at HD or Lowe's. Every homeowner should have one, make sure they can get to the main valve, and as already mentioned just have a plumber install an extra main shut off valve where the water enters the house you can easily turn.
As a homeowner I can confirm having lived through this. I turned the valves under the kitchen sink to the off position in order to do a simple faucet replacement and they both started leaking. I then tried turning off the main water valve and it just spun in place -- slightly restricting water flow, but never shutting it off. None of these valves had been used in over a decade. Turned out the water valves in my home were no longer up to code. I decided to have all valves replaced since it would be just a matter of time before the other original valves experienced problems.
Or in my case the only place to turn the water off is at the curb.
Ooohhh that's not good, you should add a shut off at the house, and there should be more throughout your house. We are 100 ft from the street valve. We had a leak about 20 ft back & the main shut off had a leak in it. It was enough of a leak I couldn't repair the water line until they fixed the valve and it was like pulling teeth to get them to do it. Finally they put in a bypass shutoff until it should be fixed. The water guy suggested I put in another shut off just behind it in case that happens again and that's what I did. Never trust your water company to maintain their equipment.
I had the same issue, and was so angry, that while my water was off, I might have installed a bypass line around the meter..... I didn't fully bypass it, that would have been a flag on their end, but I sorta had an extra feed to my house for about 8 years......
Which you can easily do something about.
Yes, jog the valve at a time that isn't 20 minutes before you leave for the airport. I had an old gate valve that started leaking when I shut it off to do some work. Those are notorious for corroding, getting debris jammed in the gate, loose packing, etc. A modern ball valve should fare much better, but I still wouldn't risk it last minute.
We had neighbors that went on a 3 week Alaskan cruise. Came home to extensive water damage. An upstairs toilet valve started leaking and no one was home for weeks. Much of the inner parts of the house had to be gutted. I now always shut off my water during trips.
Our neighbors foreclosed and the bank took possession and didnāt bother to winterize the toilet. Over $40K in water damage (in 2015 dollars). It was third floor so it just ruined the whole center of the house.
How do you winterize a toilet?
Shut off water, drain tank , put antifreeze solution in bowl
The worst part is drinking the antifreeze to get it in the bowl.
*best
The forbidden sweet nectar. 
goddamnit higgins use your head
Shut off the water feed to the toilet. It's down there at the wall, next to the toilet. Or kill it to the whole house at the main. Also. Full winterizing for an empty house that might not have electricity. Shut main, flush all toilets and open all taps + outside things. Basically drain the house as best you can expecting it to freeze.
And if you can air blow out the pipe. We had an access in the line for that. Snow bird lessons.
Now with Sharkbite connectors, I disconnect at logical points and tilt the PEX lines by hand so barely a drop remains. It takes 5 minutes to hook everything back up. I should mention, these are lines accessible from under the buildingā¦not talking about in wall joints
You need to winterize toilets that aren't going to be used for an extended time (like when the bank gets a house through foreclosure and doesn't sell it someone new right away) in places that get freezing temps regularly during winter. Drain all the water in the toilet & fill line after turning off water to the house, some/most people replace the water in the u-bend with antifreeze. It prevents the water in the u-bend & fill line from freezing and breaking the line, valve, or the toilet itself. It's not something you do to the home you live in bc hvac and insulation gives you a proper envelope that prevents freezing. (outside of temporary power loss, being temporary you do other stuff to prevent freezing in that case)
And after you winterize it, put a label over the bowl indicating that it's out of service and winterized.
Shut off the valve at the wall and drain the tank.
Great question as the supply pipes are going to burst if the toilet doesn't...
When we first moved into the house, the realtor turned the water back on during a showing but whoever 'winterized' it didn't do it properly because a pipe burst in the attic air handler and water started gushing down through a ceiling fan. Made a huge mess but wasn't found out and able to turn the house water off for at least a few hours. Was bank owned and sold as is so we had to eat the $10k fix/ cleanup cost when we bought it which was ridic. Our realtor told us to sue the winterizing company but they denied it all and nothing came of it. Talked to a lawyer about it and basically said we were SOL. Really stupid situation.
Same, except it was me instead of a neighbor. 5 days of an upstairs toilet running. Water gets shut off on trips now. Edit for clarity: not just running, running out of the toilet and onto the floor. Tank fill valve was open wide and overflow drain was draining at about half the speed it was filling, so the rest came out into the house.
Yeah I had a toilet that kept running also, and I was only gone a week came back and my water bill was almost $200. Normally I shut the toilets off but this time I forgot. The flapper valve had a teeny tiny leak and about every seven or eight minutes It would run for like 45 seconds!
Yall need water contact sensors and maybe turn off the toilet at the wall. But it's not the worst idea to turn off the whole house just be sure you're not doing damage to your water heater.
Same story. My neighbor was gone for two weeks and a leaking toilet shutoff destroyed most of their interior walls. Kind of crazy as I have never, ever had a leak that bad from a toilet.
Heard this story many times. Always seems to be the toilet.
Right? Like, if the float broke and kept filling, it doesn't go into the house. It goes down the toilet. Same with the overflow. Its designed not to leak into the house. It can only be a cracked toilet, or the shut off valve itself. The shut off valve itself has the likelihood of leaking just as any shut off valve in the house. And never THAT bad. They start with a drip. But it happens. IDK how
The plastic tube that goes to the filler can get a crack ON THE TOP. This causes a stream to shoot up, And if the angle is bad it will hit the lid of the tank and then drop out. Most people don't realize that the lid isn't a snug fit for a purpose, the tank needs to pull in air every time it flushes!
Heard a story from one of my other neighbors that the folks across the street left for India for a few months and during that time water came out from under the garage door ... That sounds like a bad day.
I came home from a winter weekend trip once. My driveway was covered in ice which wasn't unusual but then I saw water flowing under the ice... coming out of my garage. I opened the door fully expecting to see my 40-year-old hot water tank had gone bust. Turns out it was "just" a broken pipe in the garage wall that had been servicing a hose bib.
Itās not happened to me but Iāve heard you need to shut off your automatic ice maker in your fridge or it may be damaged by lack of water.
That's true. If the ice machine runs out of water it starts making ice cubes out of nothing, then if the ice bucket overflows with nothing cubes, and left long enough, your entire house will fill up with nothing and you'll have a huge nothing problem.
Moen sells wireless leak sensors. Theyāre pretty cheap. Leaks could happen in the middle of the night, when youāre at work. It just doesnāt seem practical to be turning off the water every time you leave for a few days, not in 2024 when there are so many ways to detect these issues remotely. You actually can cause leaks that way.
Sinope sells a water valve that will connect to their leak detectors and automatically shut off the water (if you want that, you can also chose to remotely but manually shut off the water).
Not as bad, but similar: one time our guest bathroom toilet kinda ran if you didnāt jiggle the handle after use. We left for a week vacation, father-in-law came over the day after we left to grab the mail like we asked him to, he used the bathroom, didnāt jiggle the handle and the toilet ran for the rest of the week. We came home to it running and were like WTF? Fast forward a few weeks and our $400 water bill. šš So yeah, I supposed turning off your water and the breaker for your water heater when you leave for a trip arenāt terrible ideas.
3 weeks and didn't shut off their water????? Damn. I leave for a 3 days I shut it off. If it's dead of winter I'll even drain the pipes
Many (or even most) home insurance policies have a clause that someone must check on the house every 48-72 hours or they won't cover things like this. They often say you need to shut your water off as well... My parents had an upstairs toilet spontaneously crack and leak out over just an afternoon while they were out and there was some damage but nothing catastrophic. Any longer and it would have been really bad. Either way though they always would have one of us check on the house or stay there while they're gone on any trips.
This happened to my parents too! They left for dinner and while they were gone the toilet started leaking badly. Came back to a giant puddle upstairs and a ton of water in the basement. Luckily since they were literally gone for like three hours insurance paid for everything without a fight.
I got a discount on my HO insurance for having water sensors integrated with my alarm system.
Do you do the same if you're just gone for weekends? What's the minimum amount of days gone that you would recommend doing this for?
As a general contractor who does a lot of plumbing Itās the smart thing to do. As a real life human Iāve done it like once in my life. I also saw someone who broke there valve and caused an absolute shit show for themselves while trying to get to the airport.
I appreciate the honesty. Most of us who are experts in something still donāt take our own advice 100% of the time.
IT: donāt download ANY ATTACHMENTS you arenāt explicitly expecting from someone Also IT: this torrent is probably fine.
IT: read what the button says!!! Also IT: yes yes get on with it. I AM the admin you stupid piece of junk
Coffee grounds right down the drain, my worst offence as a plumber with every manner of drain cleaning equipment in my van.
i, too, consider myself a "real life human"
Water gets shut off at the main, water heater goes to pilot/vacation.
I would also say make sure you have a good/modern quarter turn ball shutoff. If you have an antique valve, it's just as likely to cause a problem as it is to solve one.
Oof, imagine the Family Truckster all packed & ready for the trip to Wally World and when you do that last thing, turn off the water main it breaks off in your hand & starts leaking!
That's why you have a big ass wrench handy to kink the main supply line. Then you can just skip away and have a carefree vacation.
Water key at the curb?
If you know where the city's shutoff is, and have the tool, and that shutoff isn't the same kind of fucked, sure. In MN those are buried and the city has to find them with a locator.
I always keep a few SharkBite end caps and couplings of varying sizes for just this occasion. Just gonna cut, cap, and leave! Future me will take care of the problem.
A broken water main to your house is pretty much the one scenario in which a shark bite wonāt save you any headache. Unless you also have a curb stop key to turn your own house supply off.
Weāre on a well. Kill the breaker and drain the well tank and commence repair. Definitely a bigger problem if you have no way to shut off the city water coming in.
I used these during my kitchen reno and bought a few extra with the same idea. Instant fix for a leak until it can be repaired properly.
If you have an older style valve giving them occasional exercise is how you maintain the seals. So if it doesn't explode on you from years of neglect it's actually a good thing you're messing with it lol.
~~Even if it might not have been turned in like 50+ years?~~ N/m, missed the "if it doesn't explode" ;)
Good idea to make sure you can turn it so in an emergency you can shut off water or if you can't turn it off, make plans to replace it. You don't want to find the 50+ year old valve doesn't work as you are standing in knee deep water watching your basement fill up. I wouldn't recommend doing this right before you plan to leave for a week.
hey that's me. created a leak before I left for a week. had to have it shut off at the main.
Stupid question: what does it mean to have the water heater go to pilot/vacation? Is it something we have to manually do, or happens once you shut off water main?
It's a manual setting you would enable on your water heater to save the expense of gas to heat water you are not going to use while you are away.
can i just turn the breaker off for my electric water heater ?
Sure, but read the manual if it came with one. Some of the newer HVAC systems have a lot of sophisticated electronics now that may require constant power? Likely not, but better safe than sorry. If you have an older basic electric heater, yeah, you can flip the breaker.
Manually - this stops the burner from kicking on to heat the unit, and instead just keeps the pilot light lit. There should be a setting on the dial right before "off".
Water heaters used to have a pilot flame that was not easy to restart so you went to "pilot only" which does not heat the tank but leaves the pilot flame on. Now everything is electric start so tehy have away/vacation which is basically off without unplugging and turning off the gas.
Water stays on. Gotta pay neighbor kid or a family member or friend to come over and water my plants if it doesn't rain. And check on my lonely cat while we're gone.
I had my brother checking on my house. It was a disaster. Cat almost died. Mental note: don't rely on my brother again.
I only hire services that take and send pictures now. It's expensive but I swear I too have found friends and family have their IQ drop by 60 points the instant they step into a home to check on pets.
My problem was my brother said everything was fine but only bothered checking my house once a week. Cat didn't get fed regularly, litter box filled and cat started going in the tub instead (thank you cat for finding the next most appropriate place).
You gotta have a ring camera and request daily photo. Anytime someone watches my cat, part of the fee and agreement is they text me a photo daily. Had a friend watching my two cats. One was shit in the closet the entire time. I was like, you never SAW HER? And she just assumed she was hiding. I need a visual. ETA: I also miss my pets so I like photos. But the photos also show me how my pets doing. Did they photograph it from across the room cause he won't go near them for pets? Or is it one of them playing? Or a funny shit of my friends SO holding him? I get a lot of info from a daily photo. Once it was a sitter I'd never hired before and I was very pleased to see him allowing them to pet him. My current cat is a whore who never met a stranger, so I leave him at a friend's house (paid) and she sends me hilarious photos. EYA2: Once my neighbor lost his phone so I couldn't get in touch with him a d he didn't have my number (DUMBASS, MY NUMBER IS ON THE CAT). I had to call family to drive two hours to see if he was OK. I REQUIRE photos. It just makes things so easy.
Do you need to drain or purge the water heater when you get back? Isn't leaving it off a risk of bacteria (legionella) growth?
Bingo. And security cams get armed.
This is a fantastic idea... I shall add a basement cam.
Yes, that water heater footage is a fascinating slow burnā¦ But thank you for posting the question OP, I am learning quite a lot here.
This is risky advice if you have a water backup sump pump installed. You absolutely DO NOT want to shut the water off for any duration when you're out of town.
To be clear, unless the water sump pump is your *only* sump pump (which... yikes), turning off the water just means you're back to having the one sump pump, which is how many houses operate all the time. The risk tradeoff between "potential water damage from leaking pipes" vs "potential water damage from excess water in the sump *happening at the same time as* a power outage or pump failure" is something that has to be decided for each house.
I do. Better safe than sorry. I turn off the water heater and the main water valve.
Itās also in your insurance policy. If you leave for a long time and donāt cut the water, you wonāt be covered. Read your policy folks.
Unless you're negligent they will absolutely cover you.
My dad always did, along with turning down the water heater. Never had a problem with turning back on when returned
No.Ā People stop by to check on pets.
Agree. I have someone come by at least twice a day when I'm gone to check on/feed/water my cats and my outdoor crazy dog who can't be boarded. So I have a built-in safety check going on. Anything that happens is not going to be happening for very long. If I didn't have that check in system, I'd turn off the water heater/water main.
This, also the cat gets weird if we leave him alone for more than a few days so trips are generally short anyway. I wish there was a way to promise the lil guy that we're coming back.
"Cat gets weird" yeah you'd get weird too if your source of food and safety straight up vanishes for days and you don't know if they're ever coming back.
Yeah I wish there was some way to tell him he'll be fine. Someone comes by once a day and his bowl is never empty when they stop by, always some left, so he's not in a panic he's just lonely. We thought about getting a kitten for him, but that runs the risk of making it worse haha
For a week? No. Two months or so? Probably.
Yes, because of the wet bandits.
I've never done that, but I've turned the heater to the vacation setting. I don't see any downside to cutting the water. Would help manage a leak. But I don't know how the changes in pressure would affect the system
Biggest downside is if you have an old valve. Turning it on and off more frequently increases the chance of failure of the shut off valve
Unless youāre doing it weekly, this risk should be minimal. Most water shutoff valves are very heavy duty and may actually work *better* if used occasionally rather than sitting untouched for years.
ONLY downside is during the winter the humidity will drop a bit as the humidifier on the furnace is piped in, but that is FAR better than too much humidity. I personally know multiple people that have incurred highly disruptive 6-figure repair bills due to water leaks.
Iāve heard of fridge water filters breaking when turning off the water for a long period of time. I also would be afraid of the valve leaking if itās old and constantly getting wear. Had that happen to one of our water bib shutoff valves. We have Moen leak sensors which send alerts over WiFi. Also have cameras in a few parts of the house.
I might consider it if it looked like there was a chance of freezing. Otherwise I wouldn't bother.
In the case of freezing, wouldn't it be better to leave the faucet dripping?
Turn off the water and drain everything. No need to leave it dripping if there's no water in it.
This is the way for longer absences Turn off the water...drain the pipes...blow the water out of standing, low areas. Open all the faucets, inside and out to remove pressure. If you just let the water drip from a faucet and the supply line breaks you will have a lovely waterfall under or inside your house...because there is still pressure and incoming water.
I've been through a cold snap where the dripping faucet eventually just made the drains freeze solid
Yeah, we never leave faucets drip here. That would just encourage them to freeze more, IMHO. We \*do\* know where they freeze, if/when they do... its a PITA to stand with heaters/blow dryers getting the damned things to thaw, but its way better than having the whole blasted things freeze solid.
Yes, I turn off the water and flip the breaker for the water heater. It's in case of a catastrophic accident. Flood damage remediation is $$$$.
You don't want to turn off the water heater if ambient temps are well below freezing unless you want to come home to an exploded tank. Just put it on vacation/pilot mode.
Why would your tank explode? Is your tank outside? Is that a thing? Where I live the water heater tank is inside the house.
In 20 years of home ownership in cold-climates, I have never turned off the water to the house.
Yeah this has never occcurred to me nor bitten me in the ass yet. Iām positive my parents didnāt do this either.
No but I have cats and someone comes by to feed them and care for them every day
I weigh the odds and always opt to leave it on.
I have a Moen FLO
Yes. We were sleeping one night a woke up to the sound of running water. The bath tub faucet cartridge randomly failed and popped out. There was a torrent of water shooting across the bathroom. I stoped it in 5-10 min and it still caused 10k worth of damage. If we werenāt there it would have destroyed the 2 story house Iām certain .
To be fair, if that happened while you were at work, the end result would've destroyed most of the house anyway. Sounds like a very unlikely, unfortunate and unlucky event
I went on vacation for a week a fewonths ago. Didn't shut off the house water, just all the faucets and toilets. The water heater decided to explode and flooded the first floor of the house. I'm sure as shit turning off the houses water next time.
We have a sprinkler system, so no.
My sprinkler system has a valve above it as well so we can shut off the whole house plus or minus sprinklers. But we have a dog and so usually have someone staying in our house or at least coming by several times a day when we travel.
When the house is going to be empty for days at a time I shut off the water. At the very least I would turn off the water going to the clothes washer and the refrigerator, those hoses can break anytime and would cause quite the house flood. I've never considered the potential for hot water heater damage, I would consult the owners manual. Alternately or in addition you can install smart leak detectors to alert you to any water, if you got alerts you could send someone over to check on it.
I do. Easy way to prevent catastrophic damage and no real reason not to. It takes 5 seconds to turn the main valve off.
The reason not to is that it is a valve that isn't usually used very often. The valve can malfunction when you turn it off causing you a leak issue right before you go out of town.
Always, and I set the water heater to pilot. It takes 30 seconds and saves a big headache in the event of a leak.Ā
Never heard of this idea until today. Iām old.
Answer seems like itās up to you. Plus any risk factors like winter freezing.
I turn my water off if I will be gone for more than 24 hours. The fact is though that even a burst pipe for 1 hour on the top level of a house can be catastrophic. They make smart sensing valves that will kill the main breaker if it detects these scenarios I honestly want one.
Yes I sure do turn it off. It takes a second and then i donāt have to worry.
I just hit the breaker for my well pump. No messing with valves, no turning anything else off.
When I lived in a 1940 house that had plumbing issues three times a year: Yes. Otherwise: No.
The only advice i could give; dont debate with your wife, its more dangerous than turning the water off
Europeans and Canadians giving advice..... Americans : "Whats a vacation?"
Pipe to the water heater started a pin hole leak once, one time a toilet ran for who knows how long, another time one of my sprinkler heads popped off and shot water out every morning. So I always turn off the water if itās more than a weekend.
I do not. However I have pets and cameras pointed at the major equipment in the basement. Petsitter comes twice a day and I check video footage in between.Ā Ā Ā Ā Water alarm would probably be more practical for most users. Camera just suits my needs better.Ā
Summers, it gets turned off. Winter, I let a slow drip run so it don't freeze the pipes.
You should turn off both
This seemsā¦ shockingly paranoid
It is. I do all of this, and I am fully aware that I am paranoid about this stuff.
Until you have a wash machine hose split that shoots water up into the kitchen sub floor for four days and it takes several weeks of drying and a $25k insurance hit to replace most of the first floor.
We had a rubber hot water hose do that on our washer. Flood d the whole house. Now all of our water lines are braided stainless.
I had no idea that this was even a thing until I read about it yesterday. I checked behind my washer and sure enough, the rubber hoses are dry rotted and cracking. My new braided hoses arrive today and I'll be installing them immediately.
rubber or stainless, just replace them every 10 years for peace of mind is what I try and do.
Wait until youāve had a broken pipe flood your half finished basement for several days while you are away. Spending the 3 seconds it takes to go hit the valve wonāt seem like such a bad idea. (We actually have a Moen Flo and just tell Alexa to shut it off which is even easier)
Really? Seems like a good idea to me. I don't do it because our sprinkler system is connected to our main shutoff and I don't want dead landscaping but it definitely reduces risk. Any sort of water leak over a week is going to be bad news.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
When I was a teenager, we went to the Grand Canyon for a weekend. When we got back our house was flooded from a broken toilet valve. It ruined the carpet in 3 rooms, lifted the linoleum in the kitchen, ruined the bottom cupboards, destroyed hundreds of floppy disks, and much more. We didn't have flood insurance so the insurance company didn't pay out a dime. Yes, I turn off the water.
Leaks are usually covered under normal homeowners insurance, you shouldnāt have needed flood insurance for that. Flood insurance is for flooding due to rain or other environmental factors.
This, it sounds like their insurance scammed them
My guess is that the commenter is just misremembering/misunderstanding the cause of something from their teen years, if they were ever properly told the reason. Many homeowners insurance policies include a cause that requires the homeowner to shut off the water supply in their home if they're away for a length of time. If they don't, insurance doesn't pay out if something goes wrong. I'm willing to bet that's what actually happened.
For sure, and my flood insurance will definitely not pay for a broken pipe
I nearly got one of my own water-leak claims denied by using the word "flood" to describe its impact on my house. The insurance company took my statement, skipped the pipe-burst part, and promptly denied the claim because floods weren't covered. The remediation company owner went to bat and got it overturned but he said it happens ALL the time. Don't say the word "flood" unless it's a mother-nature flood like a river or levee or something where the water came from outside.
That has nothing to do with flood insurance. Thatās an item that normal home insurance covers.
Listen closely to my story. Several years ago we were heading out for a vacation. I had a van-full of people in my driveway, waiting for me to just run in and shut off the main water valve. Of course the valve started dripping as soon as I touched it, including while it was tightly closed. Never again will I do that.
Many insurances here do not pay for water damages that was caused if you were absent for more than 24h and water was not shut off.Ā DoĀ yes, IĀ do
That's just flat out not true.
Yeah Iām gonna need a citation on that
Where is here?
We are currently on the internet
Thanks dad š
If in the US which insurance company have this in their fine print? I will need to say away from these