Water in the basement? Get connected with a local restoration provider.

Right now: the five things that matter most

1. Stop the source if you safely can. For a pipe leak, close the main water shutoff (usually where the water line enters the basement wall, near the meter).
2. Photograph everything before you move it. Wide shots, close-ups and the water line on walls. Your insurer will ask.
3. Figure out what kind of water it is. Clear water seeping through walls, water from a floor drain, or a leaking pipe all lead to different fixes — and different insurance coverage.
4. Call your village or city public works if it's a sewer backup. Several North Shore towns ask residents to call them before a plumber. Find your town's number.
5. Start drying within 24–48 hours. The EPA says mold usually won't grow if wet areas are dried within that window.

Read the full first-hour checklist →

What's going on in your home?

Why North Shore basements flood

Most calls in this area aren't about rivers overflowing. They're about water coming up through the basement or in through the foundation during intense rain. Public sources point to a few recurring local causes:

• Older gravity plumbing. Many homes drain from the basement to the street sewer by gravity, so when the public sanitary sewer surcharges, it can back up into the lowest drain. Northbrook limits its overhead-sewer assistance to homes built before 1965, and Glenview notes many homes were built when standards allowed gravity foundation-drain connections.
• Rainwater getting into sanitary sewers (“I/I”). Glencoe calls inflow and infiltration a major problem in several North Shore communities; Lake Forest and Highland Park describe the same mechanism behind basement backups.
• Combined sewers in parts of Wilmette. East of Ridge Road, Wilmette's sewers carry both stormwater and wastewater in one pipe.
• Intense downpours. Lake Forest notes that rainfalls of two to three inches in an hour can simply exceed what the ground can absorb.

Many villages run cost-share or rebate programs for overhead sewers and backflow protection. Each town page below lists what we could verify from the municipality's own website.

Towns covered

• Highland Park
• Highwood
• Deerfield
• Lake Forest
• Lake Bluff
• Glencoe
• Winnetka
• Wilmette
• Northbrook
• Glenview

How this free service works

1. You call the number on this site.
2. Your call is routed to an independent restoration provider that serves your area (through a referral network).
3. You talk to that provider directly about timing, scope and cost. You decide whether to hire them.

This site doesn't do the work, doesn't set prices and doesn't guarantee any provider. Providers or the network pay for referrals, so the call is free to you. Details.