5 Signs You Need a Home Water Filtration System

Most people do not go looking for a water problem. They notice something small and annoying, live with it for a while, and only later find out it was telling them something. Here are the five signals worth paying attention to.

1. Spots on glassware and fixtures. White, chalky residue on shower doors, faucets and dishes is scale, left behind as water evaporates. It is cosmetic on a glass and expensive inside a water heater, and how quickly it builds tells you something about what is in your supply.

2. Soap that will not lather. Dissolved minerals bind with soap instead of letting it foam. If you are using noticeably more detergent and shampoo than you used to, either the water changed or you did.

3. Dry skin and dull hair. Two different things do this: the mineral film that sits on your shower door also sits on you, and chlorine strips the oils that keep skin and hair conditioned. Most people notice it first after moving into a house on a different supply.

4. A smell or a taste. Chlorine is the common one, and it is the single most reported complaint about water on this island. A rotten-egg smell is a different problem, usually hydrogen sulfide on a property drawing its own water, and it does not go away on its own.

5. Cloudy water after heavy rain. Sediment, and it turns up on the parts of the island that take water off the surface rather than out of the ground. It usually clears on its own, and filtration is what stops you noticing it at all.

None of these prove you need a system. They prove a test is worth doing, and a test is free.