A puddle beside the foundation has a cause, and its position and timing usually point to it. This guide helps you read the puddle, test the gutter side with a hose, and tell gutter causes from ground causes before you spend money on either.
In This Article
Read the puddle: where and when it forms
| Where the water sits | When | Likely cause | First check |
|---|---|---|---|
| Directly below a downspout | During rain | The discharge is too close, or a splash pad has sunk | Add or lengthen an extension |
| In a stripe along the wall under one run | After steady rain | The trough above is overflowing | Clear the trough and check the slope |
| In a corner where two roof planes meet | After heavy rain | Water from two slopes concentrated at one point | Look for overflow and a blocked outlet |
| Along the whole wall | A day or more after rain | Soil that slopes toward the house | Check the grading, not the gutters |
| Around a window well | After rain | A clogged well or a blocked drain | Clear the well and the drain |
| Where the extension ends, and then flowing back | During and after rain | The ground there slopes back toward the house | Move the discharge to a better spot |
| Bubbling up from a pipe at ground level | During heavy rain | A blocked or broken buried drain | Call a drainage specialist |
Water that is still sitting against the wall a day or two after the rain has stopped deserves attention, whatever the cause.
Gutter causes, in order of likelihood
- A clogged trough overflowing. The most common cause. Water spills over the front edge and lands beside the wall.
- A blocked downspout. The trough fills, then spills at the weakest point.
- A discharge that is too close. Even a perfect trough puts water where it does harm if the pipe ends at the wall.
- A downspout that has come apart or been crushed. Snow blowers, lawn equipment and ice do this often.
- A sag or wrong slope. Water pools in the trough and spills at the low point.
- A blocked underground connection. If your downspouts feed a buried pipe, the blockage is out of sight. Underground downspout drainage explains how these work and how they freeze.
Gutters overflowing, or overdue for a clean?
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Ground causes that look like gutter problems
Sometimes the gutters are innocent. Soil that has settled against the foundation, mulch piled above the level of the siding, and a patio or walkway that slopes toward the wall all send water to the same spot. So does a window well without a working drain.
The common guideline is that the ground should fall away from the house, roughly 15 cm (6 in) over the first 3 m (10 ft), but check your own municipality's rules and your foundation's needs. Grading soil around the foundation explains how to check and correct it. If a puddle persists after the gutters are fixed, grading is the next suspect.
The twenty-minute hose test
Do this on a dry day. It separates gutter problems from ground problems without any special tools.
- Clear each downspout outlet and check that every extension is attached.
- Run a hose into the top of each trough, or as high as you can safely reach, at a strong but steady flow.
- Follow the water. Watch the trough, the downspout and the ground where the water lands. Note any spill, leak or pooling.
- Time the flow. A downspout that fills, backs up or runs dry means a blockage.
- Repeat with the hose on the ground a metre from the wall. If the water runs away from the house, the grading is probably sound. If it flows toward the house, or stops and pools, the ground is the problem.
If the gutter side passes and the puddle still forms in the next rain, the fault is on the ground, not the roof edge. Do not spend money on the wrong trade.
Who to call for what
A gutter crew handles clogs, sags, joints and discharge points. A landscaper or grading contractor corrects the slope of the soil. A drainage or waterproofing specialist looks at buried pipes and basement seepage. If water in the basement has risen above the outlets, furnace or electrical panel, the Electrical Safety Authority says not to enter it, and to call your electrical utility.
D&D Home Services offers gutter cleaning from $125 for a typical Kitchener-Waterloo home, with free quotes confirmed in writing before work starts. Tell the crew where the puddle forms and how long it lasts, since that speeds up finding the cause. Read the downspout extensions guide before you lengthen a pipe.
Key Takeaways
- Where and when the puddle forms points to the cause: under a downspout, along one run, along the whole wall or around a window well.
- Gutter causes come first: overflow, blocked or broken downspouts, discharge too close, sags and blocked buried pipes.
- A hose test on a dry day shows whether the trough and downspouts work, and whether the ground slopes toward the wall.
- Call a gutter crew for the roof side, a grading contractor for soil and a drainage specialist for buried pipes.
Sources & References
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