Gratiot County, Michigan · Ithaca
Water spreading, a burst pipe, sewage, mold or smoke? Call to be connected with a restoration company that serves Alma, St. Louis and Ithaca. Start the steps below while you wait.
Answered 24/7 by a participating local provider. We're a referral service and don't do the work ourselves. How it works
Start here
Pick the closest match. These steps limit the damage and protect your insurance claim. Skip anything that isn't safe.
Pipes freeze in Gratiot County on about 46 nights a year, mostly November to March. Older homes, 42% of the stock here, are most at risk.
Basements flood here mostly in August. Gratiot County averages 4.4 days a year with an inch of rain or more.
42% of homes here predate 1960, when clay and cast iron sewer laterals were standard. Roots and cracks in those lines are a common cause of backups.
Gratiot County's wettest day in the 2015–2024 record brought 2.67 inches, and about 90 freeze-thaw days a year mean ice dams in some winters.
28% of occupied homes in Gratiot County heat mainly with wood or propane, close to the Michigan county median of 29%.
Muggy summer nights, lows of 65°F or more, come about 19 times a year in Gratiot County. Mold after a leak spreads fastest from June through August.
Local risk profile
About 41,385 people live in Gratiot County, 568 square miles in central Lower Michigan, in roughly 16,081 homes. Besides Ithaca, the county seat, the biggest communities are Alma, St. Louis and Breckenridge. Half the homes here were built before 1966, half after.
64/100 Water Damage Risk Index: Elevated Gratiot County ranks 8 of 83 Michigan counties. See the statewide ranking and method.The three factors where Gratiot County ranks highest compared with other Michigan counties.
Pipe-freeze risk in Gratiot County sits near the middle of the state. It averaged 132 freezing nights a year over 2015–2024, 46 of them at 20°F or colder, cold enough for pipes in outside walls and crawl spaces to freeze. Among 83 Michigan counties that's 50th.
On February 20, 2015 the low fell to about -19°F, and in the stretch ending March 2015 the county went 18 days in a row below freezing. Leaks from split pipes typically appear the day the thaw arrives.
Expect the hardest freezes in January, inside a season that runs November to March. That's when an outdoor spigot left connected to a hose, or a pipe in a crawl space, is most likely to split.
Freezing nights typically start around Oct 22 and end around Apr 28.
Rainfall is about average for Michigan. Of roughly 34 inches of yearly precipitation, the damage comes from the 4.4 days a year with an inch or more, ranked 30th of 83. June, August and October see the most. The single wettest day in the record: 2.67 inches, October 24, 2017. The worst three-day stretch dropped 3.94 inches, ending June 27, 2021, the kind of soaking that overwhelms sump pumps and storm sewers.
Freeze-thaw days, below freezing overnight and above it by afternoon, come about 90 times a year here. They're the main driver of ice dams and of water working its way through foundation cracks in late winter.
Housing
Michigan's 83 counties range widely in housing age; Gratiot ranks 11th, with 69% of its homes built before 1980.
42% were built before 1960. Homes from that era often still have galvanized steel supply pipe, which rusts from the inside until it pinholes, and cast iron drains that crack with age. Slow leaks behind walls are a common start to water damage in these houses.
Here 10% of housing is manufactured homes. Check the skirting and the heat tape on the main water line every fall, because that one exposed line is what freezes.
Beyond water
Summer nights that don't drop below 65°F, a good marker of humid air, come about 19 times a year here, above the Michigan county median of 10. Keep indoor humidity under 60%, as the EPA advises, and dry any leak within 24 to 48 hours; in a humid month a wet basement left alone won't dry by itself.
Mold remediation: what to expectMain heating fuel in Gratiot County's occupied homes: 57% utility gas, 11% electric, 23% propane and 5% wood. Heating equipment, cooking and electrical failures cause most home fires nationally. Even a small kitchen fire can leave soot through the whole house, because smoke follows air currents into closets, ducts and attic space.
Fire and smoke cleanup: first stepsCoverage
Calls connect to restoration companies that work across Gratiot County. The largest communities by population:
Population from ACS 2020-2024 5-year estimates. Townships and unincorporated areas are covered too.
Nearby
Isabella and Montcalm get more pipe-freeze nights than Gratiot. Saginaw County has the oldest housing nearby, with 71% of homes built before 1980.
By the numbers
| Factor | Gratiot | Michigan median | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Homes built before 1960 | 42% | 32% | 11 of 83 |
| Homes built before 1980 | 69% | 58% | 11 of 83 |
| Homes built 2000 or later | 11% | 16% | 77 of 83 |
| Manufactured or mobile homes | 9.7% | 7.3% | 20 of 83 |
| Vacant homes | 8.1% | 20% | 66 of 83 |
| Wood or propane heat | 28% | 29% | 43 of 83 |
| Nights at 20°F or colder | 46/yr | 54/yr | 50 of 83 |
| Days with 1 inch+ of rain | 4.4/yr | 3.9/yr | 30 of 83 |
| Freeze-thaw days | 90/yr | 95/yr | 59 of 83 |
| Muggy nights (65°F+) | 19/yr | 10/yr | 26 of 83 |
Rank 1 is the highest value. Bars run from the lowest to the highest Michigan county; the tick marks the median; orange means higher water damage risk than the median, green means lower.
Questions
Peak risk months in Gratiot County: freezing from November to March, heavy rain in June, August and October.
Sources: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 2024 5-year estimates (2020-2024); weather from NOAA nClimGrid-Daily county averages (EpiNOAA), 2015–2024, averaged across the county; county boundaries from Census TIGER. Reviewed 2026-10-21. Methodology