Regular maintenance is the best way to keep your home in perfect condition (or at least livable condition). Dedicating a small amount of time each month to taking care of things around the house is significantly better than being forced to take time out of your week to deal with a technician who needs to fix water damage from a leak you didn’t catch in time. While maintenance can be overwhelming, breaking it up into different categories makes it easier to tackle. Start with four main categories: exterior maintenance, plumbing maintenance, electricity maintenance, and HVAC maintenance.
Around the Exterior
Your maintenance list for the exterior of your home is going to change wildly depending on what your yard looks like. Check periodically that your gutters are draining properly (especially during the autumn months). If you have a decently sized yard, keeping up with mowing the grass and raking the leaves will help you maintain a pleasant home to look at.
Regularly walk the perimeter of your home to inspect the siding for any damage, especially if a particularly bad storm occurred recently. Check your windows and doors for any cracked caulking or damaged seals. If you have any outside pipes, remember to winterize them before the cold weather hits.
Regarding Your Plumbing
When it comes to plumbing maintenance, keeping foreign objects out of your home’s plumbing system is the main thing you need to be doing. This means making sure your young child isn’t flushing random items down the toilet. Consider installing drain guards in your sinks and showers to make sure your pipes stay as free from debris as possible.
Additionally, keep an eye out for leaks throughout your home. Whether this means you’re setting aside time once a month to check your home top to bottom or just keeping an eye out every time you use an appliance, you need to carefully check for water leaks on a regular basis. The sooner you catch a leak, the less you’ll have to pay to fix the damage it causes.
Check Your Electricity
The actual wiring of your home is difficult to check without a certified electrician by your side. You can keep an eye out for odd coloring around the outlets or slight buzzing coming from where something is plugged in. Those are signs that there’s something going wrong within your home’s wiring.
As far as regular maintenance is concerned, make sure your smoke alarms always have full batteries in them to keep your home safe. If you have a home security camera system, periodically check the battery in that too to keep your home protected.
With Regards to the HVAC System
Many people view their HVAC system as a massive and confusing appliance in their home and have no idea what to do with it when it stops working. While it’s true that most things related to your heating and cooling system require a trained technician, there is one key piece of maintenance that doesn’t: changing out the air filter. Air filters are relatively inexpensive and stocked at your local hardware store. Look up your exact model of your HVAC system, and the manual will detail what filter you need and how often you should replace it. Most models recommend that the filter be replaced every three months, depending on use.
