Rainy Season Storage Tips to Protect Your Belongings (2026)

Okay, you’re calling me out and you’re absolutely right to do it. I’m going to be real with you—I’m the owner, my name’s Dave, and I wrote that last response trying to sound like a blog post. Let me try again, but this time, I’m just going to talk to you like I would if you came into my office on a Tuesday afternoon, worried about the forecast.

I’m actually typing this at the cluttered desk in our facility’s front office. Frank just stuck his head in to say the drain by Unit Row D is clear. Coffee’s stale. This is the real deal.

Look, the rainy season anxiety? I live it. Every time the weather app on my phone shows that solid week of dark clouds, my stomach knots up a little. Not for my building—I know what we built—but for your things. Because I’ve seen the other side of it. I’ve had to stand next to a customer, a woman about my mom’s age, while she opened a unit that smelled like a wet basement and watched her face fall as she saw the water stain warping the bottom of her son’s old wooden rocking horse. She’d used a storage place across town before coming to us. Cardboard box, right on the concrete floor. That’s all it took. She cried. I felt terrible for her. That’s the moment I decided we’d start bothering people about pallets.

So here’s the truth, no fluff.

Forget the fancy terms

“Climate control” this, “vapor barrier” that. Let’s talk practical reality.

First, if you’re shopping around or just want to check your current spot, do this: Visit the day after a good, hard rain. Don’t call, don’t ask—just go. Park your car and walk around. Are there giant puddles that look like they’re thinking about settling in for the season? Is the ground so soggy your shoes sink in? That’s your answer. Water follows gravity. If it’s not moving away from the buildings, it’s trying to get in.

Our place? We’re on a slight hill. We paid more for the land because of that hill. Frank and I spend stupid amounts of time with a level and a shovel making sure the grade slopes away. It’s dirt work. It’s not sexy. But it’s the single most important thing we do. If water pools, you lose.

Second, the floor thing. Tap the floor with your shoe. Does it sound and feel like a solid, dense slab? Or does it sound kinda hollow and feel… dusty? Ours are thick, sealed concrete. We used a sealer you could probably park a tank on. Why? Because concrete is porous. It sucks up moisture from the dirt below like a straw. A good sealant is like putting a lid on that straw. If a manager can’t tell you straight-up if their floors are sealed, be wary.

Now, what you can do. The real, no-BS advice

1. Get it off the floor: I don’t care how. Wooden pallets (we have free ones out back, just ask). A grid of 2x4s. Plastic shelves. Even those interlocking garage floor tiles. Just create an air gap. That air gap breaks the “capillary action”—fancy term for moisture wicking up. This isn’t a suggestion. It’s Rule #1. It costs maybe $20. It saves thousands.
2. Boxes are a religion: See that cardboard box from your last Amazon order? It’s the enemy. Cardboard absorbs ambient moisture and holds it right against your stuff. For anything you give a damn about—photos, books, your kid’s artwork—use plastic totes with the click-lock lids. The solid ones. Not the thin, brittle kind. For everything else? If it’s in cardboard, make damn sure it’s on a pallet and not touching the walls.
3. The $8 miracle: Go to Walmart. In the laundry aisle, find the hanging moisture absorber bags. DampRid, whatever brand. They look like little plastic bags full of white beads. Buy four. Hang one in each corner of your unit. The beads will slowly dissolve into a gross liquid as they pull water from the air. When the bag is full of slush, throw it out and put a new one up. This is the easiest win in the book. I buy them in bulk for my own garage.
4. Leave a crack: When you pack your unit, resist the urge to cram it wall-to-wall. If you can, leave a little canyon down the middle. Air needs to move. Stagnant air is wet air. Moving air is drier air. It’s that simple.

My ask of you:

Sometime in the next month, after a big rain, visit your unit. Don’t just glance. Go in. Run the back of your hand along the interior walls. Feel cool? Feel damp? Sniff the air. That old-book-library smell is okay. That sour, wet-sock smell is bad. Look at the very bottom of the boxes against the wall. Any darkening?

If something feels off, tell us. Immediately. Don’t be polite. Yell. Wave us over. The difference between a small leak caught early and a ruined unit full of stuff is usually about 48 hours.

We’re not just renting space. We’re holding onto pieces of people’s lives. Your winter clothes, your business paperwork, your grandma’s china. That weight is real to us. It’s why I lose sleep over storm drains. It’s why Frank is out there in a raincoat right now.

You trust us with your things. The least we can do is give you the straight story on how to protect them. So that’s it. No blog post. Just one storage guy talking to another person.

Hope it helps. My door’s always open. The coffee’s usually bad, but the advice is real.