Every fall, the same pattern repeats across Vancouver and the Portland metro: a run of mild weather, then a windstorm or cold snap that catches homeowners off guard. The damage that follows is rarely random — it concentrates on the same handful of vulnerable points every year. Here’s what actually matters to check before the season’s first serious storm, roughly in order of how much damage each one prevents.
Trees and limbs
Pacific Northwest windstorms hit hardest where Douglas fir, big-leaf maple, and other tall trees grow close to a house. Saturated winter soil doesn’t anchor roots as well as dry summer ground, so a storm that would have been harmless in August can bring down a limb — or a whole tree — once the ground has soaked through.
- Walk the property and look up at any tree within falling distance of the house, garage, or power line. Dead branches, cracked limbs, and trees leaning more than they used to are the ones worth having an arborist assess before the season starts, not after a storm.
- Trim branches that overhang the roofline where practical. A branch resting on shingles wears through them over a season of wind even without a dramatic failure.
- If a tree already looks compromised, get a professional opinion early. Arborist schedules fill up fast once storms start rolling through.
Roof and gutters
A roof that made it through last winter fine can still have wear that shows up as a leak this year — shingles age, flashing loosens, and gutters clog with a season’s worth of fir needles and leaves.
- Clear gutters and downspouts before the rains start in earnest. A clogged gutter backs water up under the roof edge instead of carrying it away, which is a common source of ceiling leaks that have nothing to do with the roof itself failing. We cover this in more depth in our gutter and downspout maintenance guide.
- Look for missing, curling, or lifted shingles from the ground with binoculars, or have a roofer do a quick inspection. Small issues now are a much smaller job than a full roof leak mid-storm.
- Confirm downspouts discharge several feet away from the foundation, not straight against it. Roof water dumped at the foundation is a leading cause of basement and crawl space moisture during sustained rain.
Pipes and cold-snap protection
Vancouver and Portland typically see one to three cold snaps each winter with several days of sustained sub-freezing temperatures — enough to freeze and burst pipes in unheated wall cavities, garages, and crawl spaces.
- Insulate exposed pipe runs in garages, crawl spaces, and exterior walls before the first hard freeze. Foam pipe insulation is inexpensive compared to a burst-pipe restoration.
- Know where your water main shutoff is, and make sure everyone in the household does too. The difference between five minutes and thirty minutes of unrestricted flow during a burst is the difference between a contained mess and multi-room flooding.
- Disconnect garden hoses before the first freeze. A hose left connected can hold water back into the wall, freezing the pipe just inside.
- During an active cold snap, let a faucet on an exterior wall drip and open cabinet doors under sinks near exterior walls so warmer interior air reaches the supply lines.
Drainage and grading
Standing water at the foundation during a sustained rain event is often a grading or drainage problem that predates the storm, not something the storm caused on its own.
- Walk the yard during or right after a heavy rain and note where water pools near the house. Persistent pooling against the foundation is worth addressing with grading or a French drain before it becomes a basement or crawl space intrusion problem.
- If your home has a sump pump, test it now — pour a bucket of water into the pit and confirm it runs and discharges. A pump that’s sat idle often fails exactly when a storm puts it to work. A battery or water-powered backup protects against the power outages that frequently accompany the same storms that flood basements.
Power outages
Extended power outages during Pacific Northwest windstorms are common enough to plan around, and they compound other storm risks — a sump pump that’s fine mechanically still fails without power.
- Have a plan for keeping a sump pump running during an outage, whether that’s a battery backup, a water-powered backup, or a generator.
- Keep flashlights, batteries, and a way to charge phones on hand. If the outage runs long enough to affect food storage or heat, know your options before the storm, not during it.
If something happens anyway
Even well-prepared homes take storm damage some years — a limb from a neighbor’s tree, a gust that finds the one weak spot in an aging roof. If a tree comes down on your house, our guide on what to do when a tree falls on your house walks through the first hours. For roof breaches specifically, see our emergency roof tarp-over page — a properly anchored tarp can hold through weeks of PNW wind and rain while permanent repair gets scheduled.
Most storm and wind damage is a covered peril on standard homeowner policies; our guide on whether homeowners insurance covers storm damage goes into where carriers draw the line.
If a storm has already damaged your home, call TIK Construction at (360) 938-4601. A real person answers 24/7, and we handle tarping, tree coordination, structural repair, and rebuild as one job across Vancouver, Camas, Battle Ground, and the Portland metro.