Are the lack of gutters on a home a defect or just a personal choice? There are many that feel gutters affect the aesthetic appeal of their homes. It doesn’t matter if they were never installed or removed on an older home due to renovations and not replaced there are issues to consider when deciding not to use a rain drainage system. Consider this, if you take a 1000 square foot roof as an example. Every inch of rain that falls on that roof means approximately 600 gallons of water has to find somewhere to go.
Now if your home does not have gutters to properly route the water to a safe location that you choose, then it has nowhere to go except down the side of your house to the foundation. This can cause premature wear of the siding and allow water to cause damage to your foundation or enter your crawlspace.
Here are some pictures from a crawlspace during a recent Virginia Beach home inspection where there were gutters on the front of the house, but not at the rear. There was water pooling against the crawlspace walls at the back of the crawl, but not at the front. The efflorescence on the wall are evidence of a chronic issue of moisture intrusion. Having this much moisture in the crawlspace is the highway to a host of different problems.
Moisture management is important for every house and a proper drainage system is a crucial part of managing where rain water ends up at your house.
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