Hello!
It looks like the builders never installed J-channels around the windows, and we've noticed some water coming into the house through the window frame during heavy rain and wind. The internet tells me it's possible to slide some J-channel under the existing siding but I can only find videos on doing it before the siding goes on.
Any help would be appreciated :)
Edit 1: this only happened one during a very intense rain, not all the time.
Edit: Figured I'd update in case it can help anyone. I got in touch with someone to come take a look, and it turns out these windows have built-in J-channels so that wasn't the issue at all.
The problem was where the house wrap actually went behind the window, making that J-channel useless basically. While it was still taped across, that's really the only place water could have come in so there must have been a gap in the seal. So he sliced the wrap, inserted another barrier under it and layered it so that water could never get behind it again.
Also confirmed no water damage/stains around the windows so it's likely all the water that came in was caught inside by our towels.
Absolutely strip it down; this is a problem with the window installation. Water damage is a failure from the inside out, you need to screw up every layer of protection, not just the outer one. There should be an envelope that's sealed around that window with housewrap, blueskin and caulking, then metal flashings that direct any water down the outside of that envelope, then proper siding installation to keep most of the water from touching the flashings.
Yowza... I always assumed it was just the missing j-channel but not that the entire windows were installed incorrectly. Guess we've got some work ahead of us ๐