Your house flooded: what to do (and not do) in the first 24 hours

Once water is in the house, two clocks start running at the same time. One is the damage itself, which gets worse by the hour. The other is your insurer, who will eventually ask what you did from the first minute onward. This guide covers both.

Hour 0 to 1: get safe and stop the source

1. 01

   Get people and pets out

   Especially if the water came from the street or a sewer line. That water can carry sewage, chemicals and glass you will not see.

2. 02

   Cut power to the affected area

   At the panel, if you can reach it without stepping in water. If the panel itself is in the wet zone, leave it alone.

3. 03

   Shut off the main water valve

   If a pipe is the source. It is worth knowing where that valve is before you need it — go find it today.

4. 04

   Call a professional

   Even if you end up hiring nobody, one call tells you whether this can be dried in place or whether walls have to come open.

Hour 1 to 3: document before you move anything

This is the step most people skip, and the one that sinks the most claims. Before you drag out a single piece of furniture, get your phone out.

• Photos and video of every affected room, from several angles, ceiling included.
• Close-ups of the source: the burst pipe, the water heater, the door the water came under.
• The water line against a wall or a piece of furniture, so the height is visible.
• Damaged items photographed individually, not just as a pile.
• Keep the part that failed — the supply hose, the fitting, the section of pipe. That is evidence.

Hour 3 to 12: report it and start mitigating

Your policy almost certainly requires you to take reasonable steps to keep the damage from spreading. That is called mitigation, and skipping it can cost you part of the claim.

1. 1Report the loss to your insurer. Write down the claim number and the name of whoever you spoke to.
2. 2Remove standing water where you safely can.
3. 3Lift furniture off wet flooring, or put foil under the legs: wood stains carpet and the furniture itself swells.
4. 4Pull up loose rugs and area carpets so they can dry separately.
5. 5Open drawers and cabinets in the wet area so air can move through them.

The three most expensive mistakes

1. 01

   Throwing things out before the adjuster sees them

   Even if the couch is ruined, do not send it to the curb yet. If it was not documented, as far as the claim is concerned it never existed. Photograph it and hold onto it until you are told you can dispose of it.

2. 02

   Assuming a box fan is enough

   A household fan moves air. It does not pull moisture out of the room or out of the inside of a wall. Real drying needs dehumidification; without it, the water stays in the material.

3. 03

   Waiting to see whether it dries on its own

   The surface dries within hours and gives you a false sense of relief. The trapped moisture is still there, and mold starts growing somewhere between 24 and 48 hours in.

Hour 12 to 24: the mold window

This is the real deadline. Mold needs moisture, organic material — drywall, wood, dust — and time. In Orlando the ambient humidity supplies the rest. Past 48 hours you are no longer talking about drying. You are talking about remediation, which costs considerably more.

A professional dry-out inside that window usually runs three to five days with daily moisture readings. If water reached the inside of the walls or the attic insulation, material has to come open so it can dry from within — and that call gets made with a meter, not by eye.

What a real inspection looks like

A serious inspection takes under an hour and includes moisture readings at multiple points, a thermal camera pass to find what is not visible, and a written estimate. It should be free and carry no obligation. If somebody charges you just to look, get a second opinion.