Monsoon Preparation Checklist for Dhaka Renters (2026 Edition)
Monsoon damage in a Dhaka apartment is almost never a single dramatic incident. It is fifty small ones — a slow leak behind the AC, mould on a north wall, a curtain that stops closing because the rail warped, a rug that never quite dries. Most of them are preventable in one Saturday morning. Here is the checklist we run in every apartment we have rented, done in the last dry weekend before Jyoishtho.
Before you start
Take photos of every room with the timestamp on. If something goes wrong later and the landlord blames you, dated photos of the pre-monsoon state end most arguments. Save them in a folder called before-monsoon-2026.
Windows and window frames — 12 minutes
- Run a finger along the bottom track of every sliding window. Any grit that has collected there will grind the frame during monsoon vibration and let water pool. A dry paintbrush and a vacuum with a crevice tool takes two minutes per window.
- Push down on the rubber seal on the top and sides. If it stays compressed, the seal is dead. Replacement neoprene strip is ৳80–120 per foot from any hardware shop on Nawabpur Road; a whole window takes 15 feet.
- Check the drain holes at the bottom of the frame — most sliding windows have two small slots that let rainwater escape outward. In older flats these are often painted over. A pin clears them.
Balcony — 8 minutes
- The floor drain is the single most important item in this list. If it clogs, water backs into the living room within twenty minutes of hard rain. Lift the grate, pull the hair, run a bucket of water and confirm it drains in under ten seconds.
- Move anything wooden away from the railing. Even under an overhang, ten days of blown rain will finish untreated timber.
- Bring inside anything that can rust. Iron chairs, bicycle, tools. Corrosion in Dhaka monsoon is aggressive.
Air conditioner — 6 minutes
- Look at the outdoor unit’s drainage pipe. If the pipe drips onto your own AC compressor, water finds its way inside the electricals. Extend the pipe with a ৳90 flexible sleeve.
- Check the indoor drain line for the classic gurgle test. Pour a cup of water into the tray with the unit off. If it does not drain within a minute, the line is blocked. Landlords rarely fix this until it leaks; do it yourself before June.
- Photograph the outdoor unit from three angles. Half of monsoon insurance disputes involve someone claiming the unit was already damaged.
Electricals — 5 minutes
- Every outlet on an exterior wall should be checked with a torch for corrosion inside. If you see green fuzz, do not use the socket until an electrician has looked at it.
- The main breaker — know where it is. If a wall becomes wet during a storm you need to trip that circuit in under a minute, not spend eight minutes finding the panel.
- Extension cords off the floor. Zip-tie them to furniture legs a hand’s height above the tile.
Fabric, upholstery, curtains — 5 minutes
- Take heavy curtains down in rooms that face a common weather side. They will hold moisture, breed mildew and be slow to dry. Roller blinds and vertical blinds handle monsoon considerably better because they hang free of the wall and dry in hours.
- Rotate mattresses 180 degrees and leave a fan running under the bed frame for an hour with the mattress off. Do this the same weekend every year.
- Move rugs away from doorways for the season. They act as sponges every time someone walks in with wet chappals.
Paperwork — 4 minutes
- Renter’s insurance: call your provider and confirm monsoon flooding is covered under the standard policy. In many BD policies it is a separate rider.
- Landlord paper trail: email the landlord (not WhatsApp — email creates a record) a copy of your pre-monsoon photos, framed as courtesy. This is your evidence archive.
- Emergency numbers on the fridge: your electrician, plumber, AC technician, building manager. In a Saturday-night crisis you will not want to search.
What we do not bother with
- Silica gel for wardrobes — it does almost nothing in a 90% humidity room. A wardrobe dehumidifier bag (৳350, changed monthly) actually works.
- Newspaper under carpets — a folk remedy that turns into mould faster than the carpet would have.
- Sealing windows shut — do not do it. You need to be able to open them fast during humidity swings, and painted-shut windows are a fire-safety issue.
After the first big storm
- Walk the whole apartment with a torch and look at every ceiling corner. New water stains are still small on day one.
- Test the balcony drain again. Debris from the storm often shifts what a hose test missed.
- Take a second set of dated photos. Small changes are much easier to catch when you compare against week-one shots.
The whole checklist takes under forty minutes end to end. It is genuinely the highest-yield hour of home maintenance in the Bangladesh calendar. If a landlord baulks at reimbursing a ৳400 drain-grate replacement in June, that is a fight worth having, but you will not have to have it if you did the June checklist in April.