Turn off water before going on a trip?

[magma]

When you go away on a long vacation, do you turn off the water for your home? Is there any reason not to?

Brought to you by my husband and I, in our mid 40s, have taken hundreds of trips on our lives, but have never done this…but will soon take a long trip and now thinking we should.

[sdlaura]

My husband and I never have but my parents are obsessive about it and always tell us to do this. I suppose it couldn’t hurt? Assuming pipes freezing wouldn’t be an issue.

[klee23]

I'll never not turn the water off again.

We went away for 1 week this past summer and the toilet ran the entire time we were gone (float failed, overflow tube was placed incorrectly). We had to gut 2 full bathrooms on the 2nd floor, lost the entire 1st floor ceiling, walls on the first floor and replace all flooring and drywall in the basement.

Since then I've realized most people know someone that happened to. It doesn't just happen on TV.

[wanderingback]

I do not know how to do this in our apartment, so no.

We have another home and my partner goes to it ever 7-14 days for work and we don’t turn the water on and off. We do have cameras and certain alerts (including a water alert) on the property so we can keep an eye on things.

If you’re worried you could definitely just turn it off!

[devonpow]

Yes! Turn it off. We had $30k of damage from a broken water line into our fridge when away in a trip - the water remediation people who came in seemed shocked we didn’t turn our water off when we went away. We learned our lesson the hard way.

We do leave the outdoor water on when we are away in the summer so the irrigation will run, but they are different systems and it something major goes wrong won’t destroy the house

[cmeon]

We don't freeze here, but a friend went away for a few months without turning his water off, and asked us to go check on it after a month. His water line to his fridge had failed, and his place was absolutely flooded. Plants- don't ask me how, but actual plants- were growing in his soggy for likely weeks carpet. It was a warm humid jungle in there, so awful.

It's easy to turn the water off at the meter box at our house, so we do it, even if we are only gone a few days. Just not worth the risk to skip.

[origami]

Yes, always. We’ve been doing it ever since my parents’ house flooded while we were on vacation

[quesyrah]

If we did, I’m not sure how the pet sitter would be able to refill our cats water. I guess we could leave a jug? I’ve never even thought about it.

[starburst604]

I never have, though I do know people who have had water damage while away. I guess I’ve been living on the edge!

[momin2013]

Yes, always!

[felicity]

I always do. It just takes like 2 seconds to turn off the main water. Lots of things can leak and cause major water damage if not noticed for the length of at trip.

[Susie]

We don't.  Sometimes our biweekly house cleaners come during our time away, and they would obviously need water.  We also have a nest thermostat that allows us to monitor the temp in the house, and a home backup generator with phone app so we can monitor its activity, so even in winter I'm not super worried about pipes freezing.  Another leak could happen, I guess we've just been lucky.

My dad had a major flood at a vacation house over the winter a few years back, that resulted in almost a total gut of the house.  It happened on the 2nd floor of a cape, right above the middle of the house.  That was due to a pipe freezing.

[Poppy]

We came back from a long trip to a flooded basement. Yet somehow I don't think it's occurred to us to to turn off the water on subsequent trips! 🤦 Seems like a good idea to me, though.

[luckystar2]

We have never even when we did a 2 week vacation in winter. Hmmm definitely not something we’ve thought about.

[osulori]

We don't, mainly because we need the dog sitter to be able to refill the dog's water dish. Maybe we should leave a couple jugs? The dog sitter lives across the street so if he ran out I know he wouldn't mind just refilling them at his house.

[Jalapeñomel]

No, but we always have someone come over for the pets.

[redheadbaker]

We have not, because we have someone come stay with our dog. My parents do when they go on vacation.

[beerlover]

We don't, but I do have a friend here every couple days to feed my cat and give her more water, so at least someone would be here to notice if something goes awry.

[polarbearfans]

I have never done this before but I think I have heard it is something to do. I I always have a pet sitter coming twice a day, so I have never needed to turn off the water. The pet sitter needs the water for things like hand washing, filling the water bowls, and cleaning up.

[dreamcrisp1]

We don’t but I have no idea how to do even do this lol. Plus our cleaner usually still comes while we’re away a few times. We will be gone for 5 weeks this summer and she will come 3 times.

What we do though is move all alcohol to a covered and safe spot. After once arriving home at 7 am after an overnight flight with 2 tiny toddlers to discover a bottle of champagne exploded during a heat wave while we were gone and there were thousands of fruit flies, mold, and broken glass, and champagne everywhere. That was fun.

[sju]

Yes, water heater and water are turned off before we leave.

[ewall]

Yes, we turn it off. And we turn off our gas water heater because for whatever reason it gets too hot and triggers the overflow valve or something.

[macmars45]

My parents always turn off the water because 14 years ago they didn't and came home to a very expensive flooring gut job. All the flooring in one side of the house had to be replaced. My sister was checking in on their house/feeding the cats/watering the plants and she found the water damage.

[meanie]

We don't, but I will tell you a horror story that a family in our neighborhood went through...

They went away during the winter for an extended visit to India. They didn't tell their immediate neighbors like they usually would, but they had their thermostat set to keep the house warm enough so pipes wouldn't freeze.

After weeks of not seeing the family, neighbors noticed water was gushing out from under their front door. They called the police fearing that something had happened to them, and police entered the house thinking they were going to find them dead or something.

Turns out that the perfect storm happened - a few weeks before the neighborhood lost power, then we had a cold snap and subsequent warm up. Their thermostat went offline or got fried in the power outage and the pipes all froze, then it warmed up and water filled their house on every floor. The interior had to be gutted while they lived in a hotel for a year. They had to go on a payment plan with the town for the water....I think it was tens of thousands of dollars.

Soooo maybe turn off the water

[SusanBAnthony]

Yes in the winter. We should all the time.

My grandpa goes to FL in the winter. My uncle checks their house every couple weeks. He walked in to a water pipe break (I think a frozen pipe but not sure) and the whole finished basement flooded.

[JayhawkGirl]

Always. DH had a line break in his laundry room before I knew him and came home to a huge flood. Our next-door neighbors have been out of their house since they got home August 1, one week of a toilet leak, destroyed the basement, main level and upstairs. They hope to be back before the 12 month mark.

We turned off MIL’s when we cared for her house while she lived abroad. When we went to sell it, we discovered the water heater had imploded!! Thankfully it imploded instead of exploded, and thankfully we did not have water running had it exploded. That was with me checking the house at least once a week.

Always.

[aprilsails]

We always do at the cottage, even if we're leaving it empty for half a week, but that's because the plumbing is dodgy to start with.

We never have at our house, but we have always previously had cats left behind with someone coming in to check on them once or twice a day while we were away. I guess we've lived on the edge!!!

DH actually wanted a fridge without a water line to prevent issues since it did cause some at our last house. Always when we were home and had recently moved the fridge to clean underneath, so we could deal with it asap. They pretty much all have ice makers, so we do have one.

[rhian]

It's never occurred to me, especially since I've lived in apartments until recently, but after this thread, it's seeming like a good idea now that we live in a house and could actually do this!

[CloudBee]

Yes, and we have wifi water leak sensors beneath every sink and toilet in our home. After having a flood and a few leaky pipes happen while we weren't living in our home, we'll never turn back. We lived in our old house while renovating this one. We had a few old copper pipe joints go, along with a well malfunction that resulted in water gushing into the finished basement late at night. Thank goodness we had water sensors and were there within an hour. So much damage in that one hour. Flipping the valve for the house is such an easy thing to do if you're gone overnight.

[simpsongal]

Ugh, we have a 50+ year old water valve that's hard to turn. We should upgrade it....