August 26, 2026 · Honorable Home Repairs
Fort Wayne gets its share of summer storms, and the damage is not always obvious from the driveway. Some of it shows up the next morning as a missing shingle or a downed branch. Some of it takes weeks to reveal itself as a stain on a ceiling or a soft spot underfoot. Here is the walk-around Dennis does after a bad storm, and what each sign actually means.
Start on the Roof, From the Ground
You do not need a ladder to do a first pass. Walk the perimeter of the house and look up at the roofline from a few angles. Look for shingles that are missing, curled up at the edge, or a noticeably different color than the ones around them, which usually means the granule surface got stripped off. Check the ridge line for anything that looks lifted. If a tree or a branch came down anywhere near the house, look closely at exactly where it landed and what it may have caught on the way.
Check Gutters and Downspouts for New Damage
Storms do two things to gutters: they fill them with debris and they can pull sections loose under wind load. Walk the gutter line and look for sagging spots, sections pulled away from the fascia, or dents from hail or falling limbs. A gutter that is structurally fine but packed with leaves and branches will overflow at the next rain even if nothing else is wrong, so clearing it is worth doing before a full inspection, not after.
Look at Siding, Screens, and Anything That Was Already Loose
Wind finds whatever was already weak. Siding panels that were starting to pull away, a screen door that never latched quite right, a fence section that leaned a little, all of it is more likely to have moved or torn after a storm than anything that was solid to begin with. Walk the exterior slowly rather than from the porch, and check anything you already had a mental note about before the storm hit.
Watch the Inside for a Few Days After
Some storm damage does not announce itself right away. A cracked or lifted shingle lets water in slowly, so a ceiling stain, a musty smell in the attic, or a damp spot near a window can show up days after the storm has passed. If you notice any of that, or the outside walk-around turned up something you are not sure about, call Dennis at (260) 312-5874. Every look and every estimate is free and in writing, storm damage included.