Fall Storm Season Gutter Checklist for San Antonio Homes
San Antonio has two storm seasons, and the second one starts about now. The tail end of the Gulf hurricane season and the first cold fronts of the year meet over the Hill Country in September and October, and the result is the kind of rain that made the October 1998 flood and puts flash-flood warnings on your phone at 2 a.m. The gutters have had a dry, hot summer to loosen up. This is a ten-minute walk-around worth doing this week.
Up at the roofline
1. Hangers and straps
Walk the outside of the house and sight down each gutter run. You're looking for a run that dips in the middle or has pulled away from the fascia at the top edge, showing a dark gap. Summer heat dries out fascia boards and lets old spike hangers back out; the first heavy rain fills the sagging section, and the weight finishes the job. Push up gently on the middle of any run you can reach. If it moves more than half an inch, it needs hangers.
Then downspouts: each one should be strapped to the wall at the top, the bottom and every eight feet between. A downspout with a loose strap rattles in wind and then comes apart at the elbow.
2. Corners and end caps
Look under each corner for a drip stain on the ground, a green streak on the wall, or a tide mark on the porch. Sealant that cracked in August will leak in September. If you can get a ladder up safely, run a hose into the gutter above the corner for a minute and watch. A dripping corner is a $150–$250 reseal now and a rotted fascia board in three years; how to find a gutter leak walks through the full hose test.
3. Fascia
The board the gutter hangs on. Push a screwdriver into it at each corner and under each downspout. Sound wood stops it. Soft wood lets it sink, and a gutter on soft wood is coming down in a storm. Also look for paint bubbling in a band along the roof edge. If you find it, the gutter needs to come off that section and the board replaced before it's re-hung, which is a small job in a dry week and a big one after the gutter has fallen.
4. Flow
Gutters full of the dust and catkins that fell after the May cleaning won't overflow on their own, but the downspout outlets will be caught. Flush each downspout from the top with a hose and watch the bottom. A trickle means a plug, usually at the elbow. If you can't get up there, at least watch the downspouts during the first rain: one that barely runs while the gutter above it overflows is blocked.
On the ground, and above the gutter
5. Extensions
The most-skipped item. Every downspout should discharge four to six feet from the wall onto ground that slopes away. Most extensions have been kicked off by the mower since spring. Put them back, and on caliche lots make sure the water has somewhere to go once it's out there. Downspouts and your foundation explains why this matters more on rock than it does in the rest of the country.
6. The roof edge
From the ground with binoculars, or from the ladder: is there a drip edge (a strip of metal flashing) under the first row of shingles, extending into the gutter? Do the shingles reach the gutter? On roofs replaced after a hail year the drip edge is often missing, and water runs behind the gutter and down the fascia in every storm. It's a roofing fix, but it's why some gutters "leak" that aren't leaking.
7. Trees over the roof
Live oak and cedar elm limbs that rest on the roof or hang over the gutter drop debris every time the wind blows and can take out a run in a storm. September is a reasonable time to have them trimmed back. Don't trim live oaks between February and June, when the oak wilt fungus spreads; the Texas A&M Forest Service oak wilt guidance explains the reasoning.
The checklist
- Sight every run for sag; push up on the middle
- Check downspout straps at top, bottom and every 8 feet
- Look under corners for drips and stains; hose test if you can
- Screwdriver the fascia at corners and under downspouts
- Flush each downspout and watch the bottom
- Put extensions back; six feet on clay, four on ground that slopes away
- Check for a drip edge and shingle overhang
- Trim limbs off the roof
What to do with what you find
A sagging run, a leaking corner or a bad downspout is a same-week gutter repair at $150–$600, and doing it in a dry September week beats doing it after the run is on the lawn in October. If the list is long — three corners, two runs, soft fascia on two sides — it's worth reading repair vs. replacement before spending on patches. And if the house has no gutters and the mulch is trenched along the drip line, this is the last dry window before the storms show you exactly where they'd go.
If you can't get on a ladder
Most of this list works from the ground. Binoculars show sag, gaps and missing straps. Watching the downspouts in the first rain tells you which ones are blocked. A telescoping wand on a garden hose can flush a single-story run without a ladder. For a two-story house, the ground check plus photos is enough to brief a contractor, and it means you'll know what you're paying for.
What to have ready before the storms
- Phone photos of each side of the house and each run, taken this week, so you have a “before” if a storm does damage.
- A couple of spare downspout extensions and the screws to fix them on.
- A tarp and a few bricks, in case a run comes down and water starts pouring onto one spot.
- The number of whoever you'd call, written down, so you're not searching for it at 2 a.m.
Common mistakes in September
Waiting for the first storm to find out which downspout is blocked. Trimming live oaks in the spring window to get ahead of fall debris. Pressure-washing the roof edge and blasting water up under the drip edge. And leaving extensions off after the summer mowing, which is the cheapest item on this fall gutter checklist to fix.
Common questions
How long does this checklist take?
About ten minutes from the ground on a single-story house, and twenty to thirty if you hose-test from a ladder. A two-story house takes longer only if you use a ladder, which is a good reason not to.
Should gutters be cleaned before the fall storms?
If they were cleaned in late April or May and there are no pecans or cedar elms over the roof, usually only the downspouts need flushing. Under heavy trees, a quick clean-out before the storms helps, and the main fall cleaning still comes in December.
Is September too late to fix gutters before the storms?
No. Most items on this list are a morning's work, and small repairs can usually be scheduled within days. Bigger jobs such as a replacement take longer to arrange, so if the walk-around turns up a long list, get the estimate in now.
After the first storm
When the first real storm of the season has passed, take another lap. Look for new drip stains under corners, mud splashed on walls, extensions knocked out of place and any run that has dropped. Check the garage floor and the low corner of the yard. Anything that showed up is now a known problem with a cause you can describe, which makes it a quick call rather than a guess. Fix the small items in the next dry week; the second half of the season is usually still to come.
Need gutter work in San Antonio?
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