Assessing Items for Water-Damage Content Restoration

When water floods a home, it doesn’t just impact the walls, flooring, and ceiling. It can also go beyond structural damage if it comes in contact with any household belongings. Whether it’s curtains and rugs or couches and tables, there can be significant water damage to the contents of a house.

When this occurs, most people immediately think they will have to discard much of the affected items. However, it can be incredibly expensive to replace all of those items, and some things are just simply irreplaceable. 

Fortunately, content restoration services can salvage a lot of items impacted by water damage. When homeowners work with a team of professionals, they can use their expertise to help sort salvageable items from those that need to be discarded. Keep reading to learn more about how they assess different items based on their material.

Textile Materials

Homeowners don’t have to write off their favorite upholstered chair just because of the fabric, and they don’t have to throw out every item of clothing in their closet—even if it seems like a good opportunity to upgrade a wardrobe.

With the help of a licensed and certified content cleaning crew, homeowners can restore some of their textile items. In most cases, textiles can be cleaned with hot water, detergent, and chlorine bleach. Clothing, curtains, bedding, and other smaller textiles can be washed in a washing machine.

In the case of upholstered furniture, homeowners should let professionals handle the cleaning with care. They can use a combination of steam, upholstery detergent, and distilled water to clean furniture one section at a time. Best of all, they can disinfect these items to prevent mold growth in the future.

Wooden Items

Some wooden items can be salvaged, but it can be a tricky process. If the furniture is made out of pressed boards, it’s unlikely that it will ever return to its original shape even after the drying process is completed. In these cases, it would be better to discard the item. 

However, items made out of solid wood made be able to be salvaged and cleaned. It’s crucial that the furniture be placed in a warm, well-ventilated location to speed up the drying process. A fan will also help. 

If a piece of wood furniture has dark spots left behind, they are typically fixable. The contractors can simply bleach the finish and then reapply it. If white spots have developed, toothpaste and baking soda may do the trick. Of course, there’s always the option to sand and refinish solid wood furniture as well. 

Documents and Photos

Homeowners can have an assortment of documents in their homes ranging from junk mail that can be discarded to important certificates that should be salvaged at all costs. While it might seem like that pile of soaked tax documents is done for, many of the best content restoration crews now have access to tools that allow them to salvage documents and photos. 

Therefore, homeowners should sort through the papers with the crew to choose which items need to be recovered. They should also prioritize photos that don’t have digital backups or negatives.

What’s the best way to save these items? 

First, they should immediately be separated if there are stacks of papers. The water can cause the ink to bleed from one paper to the next, and this cannot be undone. From there, papers should be placed on paper towels near a fan, but the fan should never be pointed directly at them. This can cause them to rip and fly away.

A professional content cleaning crew can also use a vacuum freeze. It acts by freezing the documents and reducing the surrounding pressure. This change forces the frozen water to evaporate without returning back to a liquid, so it can prevent damage to fragile papers.

Electronics

While it might seem like any water-soaked electronics are damaged beyond repair, this isn’t always the case. It depends on the type of water and any other damage that might have occurred, but content restoration crews can restore many different kinds of TVs, computers, sound systems, and more. 

They use ultrasonic cleaning to access the fragile inner workings of the electronics. It allows them to safely clean any water or debris from inside so that the item can work again.

Find out More About How to Salvage Items with Content Restoration Services

Homeowners shouldn’t throw any of their household belongings away until a content restoration crew assesses them for damage. They can help make the final decision on what to salvage and discard.

Homeowners in the St. Louis area should contact ABC Environmental Contracting to learn more about their content restoration services for water-damaged items. Customers can call or fill out their online quote form.