My house is leaking.. HELP!

Mommie2Boogie · Wed May 09, 2007 1:33 pm

My home is a 1978 Newport 14x70. I live in Kansas City, MO and we had some VERY heavy rain over the weekend and we are now flooding in several areas. My home started to leak in the hallway door to the outside, in the top of the doorjam. Come to find out that since I have no guttering, the water just sat on this area of the house and rotted through. Its all underneath the brown border that goes around the top of the house. I call it a border cause I have NO idea what it is. Anyways... Now that it stopped raining I need to get it fixed. One of the guys that lives in the park here said he would fix it by putting a bunch of silicone in there and screwing the border back on. However I have been waiting for 2 days for him to show up and he hasn't done so. I personally don't think his idea would work. And my dad is out of town and can't help me. Basically what I need is someone to tell me how to do this, and as easy as possible. I have a 4 month old baby who is always wanting attention, and my husband is well... not mr fix it..

any help is much appreciated!!!!

JD · Wed May 09, 2007 5:26 pm

We would need more information about your home to be able to best help you. Just guessing, I am thinking you have a roof leak and not a trim leak.

What type of roof do you have? Comp? Metal?
Does it have a dormer (perpendicular roof) over the front door?
What type of siding do you have?
Can you post a picture?

JD

Mommie2Boogie · Wed May 09, 2007 7:32 pm

JD wrote:We would need more information about your home to be able to best help you. Just guessing, I am thinking you have a roof leak and not a trim leak.

What type of roof do you have? Comp? Metal?
Does it have a dormer (perpendicular roof) over the front door?
What type of siding do you have?
Can you post a picture?

JD

Ok, according to the hubby...

Metal roof
No Dormer
Alum. Siding

and I would post a picture but my batteries died in my digicam.

Does that help at all??

JD · Wed May 09, 2007 7:56 pm

A picture would help, just so I know what you are looking at. But I would bet you have a roof leak. It may be the edge where the metal ends in a j-channel, or it is possibly from a vent or ridge cap. Usually a leak in these 2 areas will show up before the edge of the wall though.

Another question on the siding. Is it flat panels of siding or lap siding? If it is flat siding, there is usually a top trim kind of piece at the top and then flat panels go up into that. The top of the trim piece is stapled to the top of the wall, the roof metal is bent over that, and the j-channel if there to seal the edge. That is why I think it is unlikely to be the siding.

JD

Mommie2Boogie · Wed May 09, 2007 8:30 pm

I can't get a picture, just tried some batteries out of our phone and the memory card is bad.

The siding is lap siding. The trim at the top can be pulled off the house.

Don't know much else to tell you... sorry.

busybee1952 · Thu May 10, 2007 3:49 am

When it seemed like every door and window in my home was leaking and I didn't know what to do, I installed metal flashing over top of each door and window sort of like a little awning and voila! No more leaks!

I have no idea why this worked because I had put the silicone on heavy around each door and window previously and it did nothing to stop the leaks. I have no idea how the water was getting in and it seemed like if it was at the roof, it would have still gotten in even after the flashing was installed but it didn't. It's worked for a year now.