MEMPHIS GUIDE

Washer, dishwasher, and water heater leaks

Washers, dishwashers, ice makers, and water heaters fail at hoses and pans, then the water goes where the house lets it. Shut the dry valve you can reach. Do not drag a live appliance across a wet floor to prove you acted.

By Mike M · Sources checked October 6, 2026 · How we write these guides

Washer hoses and the laundry floor

A washer supply hose or a drain hose usually announces itself on the laundry floor, then under the machine, then into the wall or the room below. If the shutoff valves behind the washer are dry and you can reach them without standing in water, turn them off. If the machine is still plugged in and the floor is wet, leave the plug alone. Water and a live cord are the reason to stop, not the reason to pull the unit out for a better photo.

Older laundry closets in bungalows often have no pan and a floor that slopes toward a hall or a floor register. Water will find the register and the crawlspace. Do not open the crawl hatch to chase it. Say "washer supply, valve off or not, floor wet, crawlspace not entered." If the drain hose jumped out of the standpipe, that is a drainage overflow at the machine, which may not be sewage from the street but is still dirty water. Describe what you saw in the standpipe. Do not call it a clean supply break if the water came out of the drain hose.

A one-time splash you caught, on a hard floor you can see completely, can be the towel case in the DIY notes. A hose that ran while you were out is not that case, because you do not know which cavities filled. The first-hour sequence for a true supply break is the supply-line checklist. Use it when the hose split and water is still clear supply water, and use this page to name the appliance.

Dishwashers, ice makers, and cabinet floors

Dishwashers leak at the door, the supply, or the drain into the cabinet beside them. The first sign is often a swollen cabinet floor or a kick plate that looks darker. Empty the cabinet from a dry side. If the floor of the cabinet is soft, do not climb on it to reach the valve. Shut the water at a dry valve under the sink if that is the supply you can identify. Leave the dishwasher plugged if the outlet is wet.

Ice-maker and refrigerator lines are a quiet Memphis leak because they run behind the box and sometimes through a cabinet on the way to the kitchen. Pull the refrigerator out only if the floor in front of it is dry and you can do it without stretching a cord through water. Otherwise shut the nearest dry valve and tell the crew the line is still connected. A slow ice-maker leak is exactly the kind of hidden clue on the hidden signs page: a soft spot, a musty cabinet, a stain one room over on the ceiling below.

In a two-story or a raised bungalow, look at the ceiling under the kitchen even if the kitchen floor seems controlled. Water follows the joist, not your mop. Photograph that ceiling from the doorway. If it sags, get out of that lower room. The appliance that failed is upstairs. The hazard may be downstairs.

Water heaters, pans, and closets

Many heaters sit in a hall closet, a garage, or a corner of the house with a pan and a drain line that nobody checks. A failed tank or a loose fitting fills the pan, then the pan drain, then the floor when the drain is clogged or never connected. Rust in the pan is a reason to have the heater serviced before it becomes a closet flood. Active water is a reason to use the dry shutoff on the supply to the heater if you can reach it, and to keep the power or gas controls for someone qualified if the closet floor is already wet.

Do not relight, reset, or "just see" an electrical element while standing in the closet. Note gas or electric only if you already know it from a dry day. Tell the company the closet location and whether a pan was present. Slab houses often show heater leaks as a wet garage or a wet hall. Crawlspace houses may send the same leak under the floor. Say which building you have so nobody dries only the closet.

Replacement of the heater is not the drying scope. A plumber or a licensed mechanical contractor may own the new unit, the pan, and the venting or electrical connection. Ask the restoration quote whether the heater work is excluded. The hiring page is where that license question is spelled out. A new heater set in a still-wet closet, with wet drywall left behind, recreates the smell you just paid to remove.

What to ask after the fixture is quiet

Once the supply is off, list the path: appliance, floor material, cabinet, ceiling below, crawlspace unknown. Ask the crew to meter the materials that were in that path, not only the vinyl that looks clean. Ask what they will remove. A swollen cabinet floor and a wet pad are common. A whole kitchen demo needs a reason tied to readings, not to the age of the cabinets.

Ask who repairs or replaces the failed hose, valve, or heater, and whether that cost is inside the drying number. Those parts fail again if the only work is fans. Hoses and supply valves are ordinary maintenance after this, but this page will not tell you a replacement interval. Have a qualified person look at the one that failed and at its twin on the other faucet. Get the drying stop condition in writing. What changes the price of that visit is covered in the cost factors, still with no invented dollar figures.

Keep the model information only if you can read it from a dry spot. You do not need the serial number to stop the water. You may want it later if a manufacturer asks how old the part was. Store that note with the photos, off the wet floor, and with the sentence that says whether the water was supply water or drain water from the machine.