This article is to help flood victims access their damage and keep an open mind as to what steps need to be taken before moving back into a flood damaged mobile home.
Structural Concerns:
Depending on the year manufactured, mobile homes can be set onto a foundation, concrete footings, or concrete block with no footings. In this picture, the mobile home was set on concrete blocks laid on the ground. This technique is no longer allowed, but can still be found. One of my structural concerns was the flow of water undermining the concrete block columns. After the water recedes, these columns can still shift from the ground being saturated. These concrete blocks will need to be monitored for months to come for further movement.
In this specific mobile home, the flood caused about 6' of water to push into its side. This massive pressure caused the mobile home to shift. My other structural concern is the strapping that secures the frame of the mobile home to the ground. There are typically 4-6 straps per side. In this picture, the strapping is loose. These are supposed to be tight. The straps down both sides need to be tight. If the structure shifts to 1 side, one side can still be tight while the other is loose. In this case, the structure shifted in both directions and I found loose strapping on both sides of this single-wide.
If your mobile home is set on concrete footings, these same concerns with undermining, shifting, and loose strapping exists.
Electrical Issues:
Electrical components and water don't mix. No matter how normal the inside of your mobile home appears, however high the water level reached, the wiring, outlets, light switches, and other electrical components were damaged if they were wet. You can spend all the effort of tearing out the drywall, insulation, cabinets, etc., drying the rest all out, properly remediating for mold, then replacing all the water damage with new. 1 week, 1 month, 1 year later, one of those corroded/rusted connections in the wiring that you didn't replace might arc, and catch the mobile home on fire. Arcing can exceed 2,000 degrees F when it happens. Make sure you have a licensed Electrician go through every electrical component that was wet and make sure they are safe. If the home isn't dried up quickly, even the wiring that didn't get wet from the flood water can still become damaged from the high humidity while the place dries out. Be prepared that all of the wiring may need to be replaced.
In this picture, the water level was approximately 8" above the bottom of the window.
Any appliance that was under water, no matter how new it was, is damaged. The electrical components of the furnace, dishwasher, fridge, freezer, etc is ruined. They weren't designed to get wet. These submerged appliances will need to be replaced.
Water Damage & Mold Remediation:
In this mobile home, water was about 2' to 2 1/2' up the walls. So what do you do? You need to take a step back and start calculating what it will take to get this mobile home back to safe living conditions. Most will conclude that it's a total loss and it's not worth continuing. I'm going to walk you through step-by-step what needs to be done so you can apply this logic to your situation so you can make an educated decision.
The obvious step is removing all of the sopping wet carpet, drywall, and insulation. For proper mold remediation, the drywall and insulation is supposed to be removed 3' higher than where you can see the mold or know it was wet. If water was up the walls, you're looking at removing all of the drywall and insulation on the walls throughout. All of the water damaged cabinets need to be removed in the kitchen and bathrooms. If the water level reached the electrical components of the appliances, they are damaged and need to go. Any wet wiring, outlets, switches, etc...will most likely need to be ripped out and replaced by a licensed Electrician.
You have 48 hours before mold starts to grow. If you can't dry the mobile home out within that time frame, then mold starts to flourish. It will start to smell, mold spores will develop on every surface, and the only way to do things right is to have a Mold Remediation Contractor come in and remediate.
Opening the windows will help initially, but once you have the sopping wet items removed, you'll need to run dehumidifiers to remove the moisture.
The OSB sub-floor needs to dry out. Having the dehumidifiers inside the mobile running will help the top side. Underneath, the insulation blanket is going to be soaked and keeping the bottom of the sub-floor wet. You'll need to cut out the damaged insulation and let the outside air try to dry the bottom out before the wood chips and glue in the OSB start to de-laminate. If you aren't able to get this dry fast enough, the sub-floor may need to be replaced.
The duct work that runs under the mobile home will be full of flood water. Any moisture left behind can turn into mold being circulated throughout the mobile home once the furnace or AC is turned on. You can have it professionally sanitized and cleaned or replace it.
Because you're dealing with flood waters, you'll want to decontaminate all of the surfaces remaining inside the mobile home before you start to remodel.
Once dried out and clean, then you're looking at installing insulation, drywall, carpet, cabinets, appliances, etc.
If the water level was too high, most would conclude that it doesn't make financial sense to attempt to repair. It's best to re-attach the axles, hook a truck up to the mobile home, and haul it to the dump.
If you need help figuring out the extent of your damage in Eastern Nebraska or Wester Iowa, call us at 402-330-1701.
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