Termites are the rare pest problem where what you don't see is the whole story. By the time most Georgia homeowners get visual confirmation, the colony has usually been feeding for years — and with insurance treating termite damage as “preventable” (translation: not covered), early detection is worth real money. Here are the six signs worth checking for twice a year, roughly in the order you're likely to encounter them.
1. Mud tubes on the foundation
The most reliable sign there is. Subterranean termites dry out quickly, so they commute between soil and wood inside pencil-width tunnels of dirt and saliva. Walk your foundation — outside and, if you have a crawl space, inside it — and look for brown, veiny lines climbing block, brick, or piers. Fresh tubes are damp and intact; break an inch out of one and check back in a few days. Rebuilt means active.
2. Swarmers indoors, or piles of tiny wings
A spring swarm inside the house — or drifts of small, identical wings on window sills — is as close to a positive test as termites offer. We covered exactly what to do about it in our swarm season guide; the short version is: don't spray, bag a sample, book an inspection.
3. Wood that sounds wrong
Termites eat wood from the inside out, leaving a thin shell. Tap baseboards, door frames, and sill plates with a screwdriver handle: healthy wood knocks solid; termite-hollowed wood sounds papery or dull. If a screwdriver tip pushes into a joist or sill with little resistance, stop poking and start dialing — that's advanced feeding.
4. Bubbling paint and rippled drywall
Termites bring moisture with them as they feed, and their galleries just under a painted surface make it blister, bubble, or ripple — which is why active termite damage gets mistaken for a water leak so often. If a “water stain” has no plumbing or roof explanation, or you spot tiny pinholes with traces of dirt in drywall, think termites first.
5. Sticking doors and windows
The subtle one. As termites damage framing, it shifts and traps moisture, and doors or windows that always worked start binding. Every old house has a sticky door somewhere — but a door that became sticky recently, especially alongside any other sign on this list, earns an inspection.
6. Sagging floors and stains on crawl space wood
In the metro's many crawl-space homes, the floor system is where termites do their most expensive work. Soft spots or new bounce underfoot, visible dirt trails or staining on joists, and damp, earthen-smelling wood are all late-stage flags. This is also why the homes that fare best here are the ones where a professional actually gets under the house once a year.
The twice-a-year self-check
- When: early spring (before swarm season) and fall.
- Outside: walk the full foundation looking for mud tubes; check wood-to-soil contact points — deck posts, fence lines, siding that meets mulch.
- Inside: tap-test baseboards and frames; scan sills for wings; note any new sticking doors.
- Underneath: if you can safely access the crawl space, flashlight the piers and sills — or leave that part to us.
- Reduce the invitation: keep mulch pulled back from siding, firewood off the ground and away from the house, and gutters draining away from the foundation.
Found something? Here's the honest next step
One sign doesn't always mean active termites — old tubes and long-dead damage are everywhere in a state this infested, and telling old from active is most of an inspector's job. That's exactly what our free termite inspection settles: we'll tell you what's historical, what's active, and what (if anything) it needs. And if the answer is “nothing, you're clean” — we like delivering that one, and we'll say it plainly. That's how it works everywhere in our Metro Atlanta service area.