Has Houston been experiencing long periods of time without rain? If so, then you need to act accordingly for the health of your foundation, as periods of extreme weather can damage the structure of your home.

Although the hurricane season is fast approaching, it’s not too late to prepare your home before a big storm heads your way. While there are different things you can do to hurricane-proof your property, lifting your home is the most efficient way to reduce its risk of flooding during hurricanes, tropical storms, or heavy rains. Since hurricanes and tropical storms are expected to occur more often in the future, elevating your home as soon as possible is critically important in order to protect your living space from flood-related damage and avoid all the hassles and costs associated.

Nowadays, you can find a wide variety of landscaping ideas and tips to transform your property into a breathtaking retreat that looks just like the ones from the Home and Garden TV shows. But regardless of your landscape needs and wants, or the plants, shrubs, and trees you wish to plant, one thing you should remember is that proper landscaping can do much more than just improve the appearance and overall value of your property. In a nutshell, proper landscaping can help you prevent foundation damage and extend the lifespan of your Houston home. Here are a few tips and tricks on how to plan and maintain your landscape for a healthier foundation.

The foundation is one of the most important structural components of any building. Because the foundation plays a crucial role in the overall construction quality as well as the building stability and durability, it must be strong enough to support the weight of your home and withstand the stresses resulting from temperature fluctuations, slight soil movement, and hydrostatic pressures. For this reason, experts always consider specific elements, including the home design, climate, and type of soil on which the home will sit, when designing and building a foundation. But regardless of how well-designed and well-built a foundation is, or when it’s been constructed, protecting it from specific factors is imperative in order to ensure it will stand the test of time. 

Because mild temperatures tend to dominate Texas during the winter, potential freezing and thawing aren’t typically considered a great threat to our Houston homes. But cold weather can still be very detrimental to your home. That’s because low temperatures along with occasional snowfall, freezing rain, and ice can irreversibly affect your foundation and cause extensive structural damage throughout your home. To understand how the February snow storm and cold outbreak might have impacted your foundation, let’s take a look at some of the adverse effects that freezing temperatures and snowfall can have on a house foundation.

Although snowfall is quite rare in Houston, the cold weather can sometimes bring freezing temperatures, ice, and copious amounts of snow. What’s more, specific factors, such as cold air interacting with relatively warm, humid air, could cause a winter storm to occur unexpectedly, just as it happened in many locations across Texas a few weeks ago.

The season for spring landscaping is almost here, and many Houstonians are looking at what they can do to boost the curb appeal of their homes. One of the simplest ways to improve your home’s curb appeal is to implement specific landscaping ideas that can transform your property into a relaxing oasis this summer. Whether you choose to plant trees, shrubs, flowering plants, or ornamental grasses, installing root barrier systems is the only way to protect your home’s foundation, garage, walkways, driveways, and other structures from potential structural damage.

Not only do sewer overflows lead to unpleasant odor problems, but they can also cause property damage and unhealthy living conditions. In addition, the clean-up and drying out process after a sewage spill can take several weeks in enclosed spaces, like your home or crawlspace. The failure to clean and dry out your crawlspace and living areas properly and as quickly as possible could lead to musty odors that may persist in your home long after you’ve finished cleaning. As well, mold could develop underneath your flooring, inside your walls, cabinets, and in any other enclosed spaces that have been exposed to sewer water. 

If you live in Texas, you already know that droughts can have a devastating effect on the environment. But what many Texans don’t know is that a prolonged drought can adversely impact our homes as well. In an effort to combat the adverse effects of droughts, water use restrictions are put into place by local governments throughout the year. These restrictions along with specific strategies, such as the inter-basin water transfers, are helping us to better address the cyclical pattern of droughts and floods, while meeting the water needs of the entire region. Despite these positive aspects, water conservation practices in conjunction with recurring drought conditions often lead to lower soil water content, which in turn can compromise the structural integrity of our homes.

In addition to giving you the peace of mind that comes with knowing that your loved ones are protected during flood events, home elevation allows you to continue living in your own home and in the same neighborhood, while saving you a lot of money that you would otherwise spend to repair your home every time it’s damaged by a flood.