I was not home for the majority of Sunday and while I was out, I received a phone call from the building manager. He said that the unit below me I had some pooled up in the living room and they wanted to check if the leak was coming from my apartment. I was unable to come home immediately but I did check the security camera that I have in living room. I didn’t see anything weird. My camera also has audio and I didn’t hear the sound of water either. I had some doubts that whatever leak was coming from my place.
I returned home as soon as I could, without upending my original plans. When I arrived home, I saw a mysterious puddle of water in my living room. It was about three feet long and about a foot wide. It would be the amount of water you’d see if you spilled about a glass of water on the floor.
I texted the building manager and let him know I was home. A few minutes later, he arrived at my door with a plumber in tow. They checked a whole bunch of things in my apartment but to make a long story short, they determined the leak did not originate in my apartment. There’s a long wall that divides my living room from my bedroom and the water pipes are inside this wall and they go up to the unit above and down to the unit below.
I could see the faint lines of a water stain on my flooring and I could tell the water actually seeped from inside the wall, underneath the floor moulding, and onto my flooring. The plumber determined whatever was the source of the leak, it was above me. The building manager and plumber then left to go above me to check on those units.
I was left to clean up the water. I used a bath towel to soak up the water and it didn’t take much effort to do so. I remember the flooring guy that sold me my floors said that my floors could handle liquid spills for about 24 hours before it might be a problem. I wasn’t away for nearly that long so I’d like to think my flooring is still ok. Just to make sure, I turned on a fan and blew air along the affected area to help dry out the floors.
The bigger question is what condition is my wall in on the inside? Is the drywall all mushy and wet in there? Or did the leak basically go under the drywall, miss all of it, and just pooled up on my floors?
The building manager came by later to tell me they weren’t able to find the source of the leak but he did tell me that he knows that the person on the 30the floor installed a new dishwasher a few days ago. They couldn’t find any evidence though that this was the issue. So, there’s nothing to be done for now. You can fix a leak that you can’t find.
Every couple of hours I go and check the area to see if any new water has accumulated but so far, there has been nothing. In terms of water leaks, this was on the lower scale of impact. I am thankful I didn’t come home to my entire apartment covered in inches of water. It was clear that some amount of water leaked into my apartment and then stopped. While I am thankful it wasn’t catastrophic, it worries me that this happened in the first place and we don’t know why and where the source of the leak is. In my experience, water leaks aren’t a one-time event and they don’t usually fix themselves. I don’t think this is the last time I’ll have to deal with this problem and that worries me.
What troubles are ahead of me?