Most expensive water damage is not dramatic - it is a $6 supply line dripping for three months. Once a month, spend fifteen minutes: look under every sink, behind the toilets, at the water heater base, and at the washer hoses. Feel for dampness; look for mineral crust and rust blooms that mark slow weeps.
Add the foothills rounds. Read the meter after cold snaps, before the ceiling announces the split. Check the uphill foundation wall's base after every hard storm for a season, because slope soil delivers its verdict late. Walk the roofline after ice winters for the eave stains that mean dams formed. And keep the sump pit's trend in spring: in the creek side streets, a rising pit in a dry week is the drainage system filing a report.
Meter trick: note your water meter reading last thing at night with everything off, then check it first thing in the morning. A changed reading with no use means water is going somewhere it should not.
Replace rubber washer hoses on a schedule, not after a failure - braided stainless lines are cheap insurance. And know where your main shutoff is before you need it at 3 a.m.; finding it is a daylight job.
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