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 Front Range rounds to the checklist. Read the meter with the house quiet in freeze season and after thaws, because the split pipe announces itself in the bill before the ceiling. Check crawl spaces after cold snaps, not after stains. Read the basement wall base after every major storm for a month, because clay soil delivers its moisture late. And log the sump pit's water line in spring, since a rising pit trend is the cheapest warning this housing stock offers.
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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