What is the name of your state? Colorado
We had some serious rain in Denver at the beginning of the month, it was estimated that almost 2 inches of rain fell in a 30 minute period. We live at the top of a street with a good incline down to the main road. We also have a finished basement. It was during this rain that we heard the sound of water running. Going downstairs I see that our window well was starting to imitate a fishtank (minus fishes).
I holler for my wife and I ran out to start bailing. Needless to say, some 40 gallons of water sucked out of the carpet, a week of fans drying we thought we had a drainage problem... on our property.
We ran water down the side of the property but nothing leaked into the window well. We assumed that it was just due to the large amount of rain in such a short period of time. Now being paranoid (as any good homeowner should be
) during the next shower that passed our area I sat with face plastered to the basement window watching to see if we would have a repeat performance. We did, the funny thing was the water was flowing in from under the bottom of the steel window well. OK, now the water flowing in didn't correlate to the amount of rain coming down. It looked like a faucet was turned on.
My neighbors downspout came out about 3 feet to the side and 10 feet across from the window well. Brilliant flash of light maybe it was coming from his downspout. Wet/dry vac saved the basement from soaking but not me, I was out there for an hour ensuring no more water entered our house. The next day I explained to our neighbor that we had a flooding problem and would like to rule out the possibility of it coming from his house. He ran the hose to the downspout and turned it on. 2 minutes later water was leaking into our window well. I dug down and found a channel coming from his downspout. When we looked at the pipe, it was canted and pooling water directly from the spout, the T had broken loose and water flowed freely out straight to our property.
I sealed around the window well, closed the channel back to our property line, tamped it down pack. I spent days working on our drainage, removing all the rocks and old plastic lining, regrading and tamping the entire side of my house to ensure proper flow away, trenching then relining, pea gravel, perforated drain pipes, all the way out to the street. We have had several rains during the time where I had to man the Shopvac for hours and have not heard a peep from my neighbor. Now that the project is nearly done, I've offered up my extra plastic lining to help line his drainage pipe. I'm about ready to help him grade the pipe so it slopes away to the street. He's not responding and I'm trying to be nice but frustration has set in
.
I haven't asked for any compensation but I don't know if I have a right to. Any other suggestions on how to get him to help out? Should I take this to small claims? What do you think?
We had some serious rain in Denver at the beginning of the month, it was estimated that almost 2 inches of rain fell in a 30 minute period. We live at the top of a street with a good incline down to the main road. We also have a finished basement. It was during this rain that we heard the sound of water running. Going downstairs I see that our window well was starting to imitate a fishtank (minus fishes).
I holler for my wife and I ran out to start bailing. Needless to say, some 40 gallons of water sucked out of the carpet, a week of fans drying we thought we had a drainage problem... on our property.We ran water down the side of the property but nothing leaked into the window well. We assumed that it was just due to the large amount of rain in such a short period of time. Now being paranoid (as any good homeowner should be
) during the next shower that passed our area I sat with face plastered to the basement window watching to see if we would have a repeat performance. We did, the funny thing was the water was flowing in from under the bottom of the steel window well. OK, now the water flowing in didn't correlate to the amount of rain coming down. It looked like a faucet was turned on. My neighbors downspout came out about 3 feet to the side and 10 feet across from the window well. Brilliant flash of light maybe it was coming from his downspout. Wet/dry vac saved the basement from soaking but not me, I was out there for an hour ensuring no more water entered our house. The next day I explained to our neighbor that we had a flooding problem and would like to rule out the possibility of it coming from his house. He ran the hose to the downspout and turned it on. 2 minutes later water was leaking into our window well. I dug down and found a channel coming from his downspout. When we looked at the pipe, it was canted and pooling water directly from the spout, the T had broken loose and water flowed freely out straight to our property.
I sealed around the window well, closed the channel back to our property line, tamped it down pack. I spent days working on our drainage, removing all the rocks and old plastic lining, regrading and tamping the entire side of my house to ensure proper flow away, trenching then relining, pea gravel, perforated drain pipes, all the way out to the street. We have had several rains during the time where I had to man the Shopvac for hours and have not heard a peep from my neighbor. Now that the project is nearly done, I've offered up my extra plastic lining to help line his drainage pipe. I'm about ready to help him grade the pipe so it slopes away to the street. He's not responding and I'm trying to be nice but frustration has set in
. I haven't asked for any compensation but I don't know if I have a right to. Any other suggestions on how to get him to help out? Should I take this to small claims? What do you think?
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