How often should you check under your sinks for leaks?

Why bother

Water damage is the #2 home insurance claim. This is an essentials-tier job. Skip it and you're inviting the expensive kind of problem, or the dangerous kind.

What the job involves

1. Clear everything out from under the sink. The bottles, the bin bags, the spare sponges, the lot. You want a clear view of the cabinet floor and every pipe down there.
2. Run the tap and the disposal for a minute, then feel along the supply lines, the shutoff valves, the drain, and the P-trap. Any wet, any drip, any damp spot. A leak hides where you can't see, so use your hand.
3. Look and have a sniff for the slow-leak tells: water stains, a buckled or swollen cabinet bottom, peeling, a musty smell, or rust on the metal fittings. A drip that's been going a while leaves a mark.
4. Snug any slightly loose slip nut or supply-line connection by hand or with a wrench, then wipe the whole area dry. Dry now means any fresh wet next time stands out.

Do it yourself, or pay someone?

Yourself for the check, easily: 5 to 10 minutes, no tools. Most fixes too, a P-trap or slip-nut kit runs about $7 to $15. Call a plumber if the leak's at the wall, inside a valve, or it's already done damage: a pro P-trap swap runs about $150 to $250, general leak repairs $150 to $850 depending how bad.

What skipping it costs

$1,300 to $6,300 is the typical water-damage restoration job once a hidden leak has had its way: drying it out, then replacing the soaked drywall, subfloor, and cabinet. That's the everyday outcome of a slow drip that sat in a dark cabinet for weeks before anyone looked. The severe cases run far higher, and if mold has set in behind the wall, remediation averages around $2,300 on top. What it started as was a $10 washer.

Signs it's overdue

• A musty, damp smell when you open the cabinet, or a cabinet floor that's gone warped, stained, or soft and swollen.
• A water bill creeping up for no reason. The EPA reckons household leaks add about 10% to the bill, and the average home wastes over 9,300 gallons a year doing nothing useful.
• Visible drips, beads of water, or rust and mineral crust on the supply lines, shutoff valves, or drain fittings down there.

When to start thinking about it

A few days' warning does it. Grumpty grumbles 3 days out, then leaves you alone. Mark it done and Grumpty sets the next one, every 6 months, so you can go back to forgetting it exists.

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