Oh boy! That time of year is upon us Fort McMurray! When some of us truly believe there must be a leak in the roof but the spoiler alert – it’s very, very likely attic rain.

“What?”

You ever look up to see dripping from the ceiling fan?

Have you been standing in the bathroom, to feel a cold and very uninviting drip of water hit your skin, sending a shiver down your back?

Well, we have.

The urge to call because you are experiencing a roof leak or ceiling leak is likely a 12 out of 10 the moment you realize this doesn’t appear to be settling down.

The good news?! It’s probably attic rain. Bummer, we know.

For those of you asking, what is attic rain… allow us to explain.

Attic rain occurs when warm moisture accumulates in the attic, freezes during cold temperatures, then melts when the weather warms again or there is a large difference external to the home versus inside the home. This see-saw in weather produces the perfect attic-crying conditions that certainly can damage your townhome. In Fort McMurray, we are very likely to experience this as homes are built to be efficient and experience ongoing extreme weather swings that create the perfect environment to allow for condensation to accumulate causing “attic rain”.

We have a few recommendations we would like to share here with you, and this should help minimize or resolve this issue if you do experience it.

 

  1. If you are not sure that the attic upgrade was completed in your unit, call us! We spent a lot of time this Fall, ensuring we got to each unit, however, if for some reason you are the odd one out. Please let us know.
  2. Run your bathroom fan longer. Before and after you shower or soak in the tub, run the fan longer to help keep air moving and prevent build up that leads to that dripping you may experience.
  3. Turn down your humidity! Right now we know with Winter being dryer than the Sahara Desert, its tempting to turn that up. That’s going to make it rain. No pun intended.
  4. Open windows. We know, it is absolutely frigid out. In high efficiency homes, built to be air tight, its really helpful to open doors when weather allows, to help wick away that excess moisture build up. Keep your townhome as dry as you can.
  5. Turn down your temperature a touch. Even a one to two degree dip will make a difference. When its into the double negatives, this has huge effect. Sorry Albertans, the unfortunate truth about our beautiful province includes managing our wild weather fluctuations.
  6. If these things fail, please call us to have a look. We do encourage you to call and ask questions about these efforts and we want to ensure that we do keep an eye on it. We want to be sure that nothing more sinister is going on up there such as an air leak.

We have taken steps to mitigate this is through ensuring that the attics are properly ventilated with the correct number and location of roof vents and soffits. Roof vents draw air out of the attic while soffits bring in air from the outside, allowing the air to circulate. We spent several months upgrading the whirly birds installed through the townhomes as well we completed ventilation upgrades.

We have seen a major improvement in the presentation of attic rain or that common dripping from the ceiling fan, however, it is still subject to user influence.

If you need to have a chat with us about concerns you may be experiencing, reach out. We do enjoy connecting with all of our residents and tenants, no question is not worth asking.