Signs You Need to Hire a Plumbing Service | Richmond, VA

5/6/2020

Photo By Andrey_Popov at Shutterstock

If you want to prevent costly damage to your home, taking care of your plumbing system is an important step. However, many people don’t know what to look for in terms of problems and when it’s time to hire a plumbing service. The truth of the matter is, you should keep a close eye on your plumbing system and call a professional whenever you notice a problem with anything. If you want to keep your water on and prevent expensive water damage in your Richmond, VA, home, here are some common signs that you need to call a plumber.

High Water Bills

Keeping an eye on your water bill is one of the best ways to make sure you don’t have any hidden problems in your plumbing system. While your water bill is going to change a bit from month to month, you shouldn’t see any drastic increases in water usage from one month to the next. If your water bill is unusually high, have a plumbing service check out your home for problems.

One of the most common problems when it comes to a high water bill is a running toilet. The good news is, the fix may be fairly simple. Unfortunately, there are times when the best way to fix a running toilet is to simply replace it, although that isn’t extraordinarily expensive either.

Leaks are another possibility to consider if you have an abnormally high water bill. Even a small leak can cost you quite a bit over the course of a month, and those leaks only get worse with time. If none of the toilets or fixtures in your home are leaking or running constantly, have a plumbing service check your pipes for leaks that may be spewing water under your home.

Sewer Odors

If there’s one thing you should never mess around with on your own when it comes to plumbing, it’s a bad sewer odor. While there are times where a fixture or pipe may smell for a different reason, exposing yourself to toxic sewer odors is never a good idea. The best thing you can do if a fixture is giving off a particularly bad smell is call a plumbing service to get the issue fixed.

Often times, a sewer odor may be a result of a dried-up P trap. These traps are designed to go underneath drains to keep out sewer gas, but they can only do that if they have a little bit of water in the right part of the trap. If you don’t use a drain for a long time, the trap may dry up and eventually cause a sewer smell.

In some cases, the sewer odor in your home could be a result of a blocked air vent. These air vents are crucial to keeping things flowing properly and venting sewer gas out of your plumbing system, so you need to call a plumbing service as soon as possible if you think that’s the problem.

No Hot Water

Of all the reasons people decide to call a plumbing service, not having hot water is one of the most common. The fact of the matter is, it’s hard to go about your day if you don’t have access to hot water in your Richmond, VA, home. Unfortunately, water heaters don’t last forever, which means there will come a time when your hot water will stop working.

The good news about having no hot water in your home is that it’s generally a pretty simple fix. In many cases, your water heater just needs a new heating element or two to allow it to fully heat the water in the tank.

Even if you have to replace your whole water heater to get hot water in your home again, a plumbing service can do that for a reasonable price. Best of all, your new water heater is designed to last for another decade or so, so you don’t have to worry about replacing it anytime soon. You can even upgrade to a larger or more efficient water heater to make things a little more convenient for yourself.

Clogged Drains

A clogged drain might not seem like a huge deal at first, but it can become one if you don’t take care of it. Much like leaks, clogged drains tend to get worse over time. The larger the clog gets, the more gunk it will attract as water passes through. Eventually, your drain might take minutes to empty out a sink or tub full of water.

If you have a clogged drain that isn’t going away with drain cleaner, it’s time to call a plumbing service. While enzyme-based drain cleaners do a good job of eating away at clogs and knocking out the smaller ones, sometimes you need to actually disassemble the drain or use physical force to remove a clog. The only safe way to do this is to have a plumber do it.

While we’re on the subject of drains, you should never use chemical-based drain cleaners such as Drano. Despite being the most popular choice for most households, these drain cleaners use harsh chemicals that can eat away at your pipes and cause more damage than they fix. Enzyme-based drain cleaners accomplish the same goal without causing any damage to your pipes, which is why most plumbing services recommend them.

Dial a Pro

If you want your home to stay in good shape year after year, you have to take care of it. Your best bet is to educate yourself so you know when it’s time to call a plumbing service to fix a problem.

At bluefrog Plumbing + Drain of Richmond, VA, we have the knowledge and tools to fix whatever plumbing problem you’re dealing with in a flash. Next time you have a leak, a lack of hot water or some other problem, call bluefrog Plumbing + Drain today!