Maintaining Your Home In Winter Months

As property inspection professionals – we perform regular real estate home inspections on homes every single day… and we see a ton of stuff. One thing that always stands out – is when a home has not been properly maintained.

Of course, not every family has a strong man to do all the heavy lifting that some maintenance requires, or a savvy lady who likes to ‘do everything’ on her own. Home maintenance is an general to-do for every household and we all do the best we can.

It helps to know about seasonal changes here in Texas and be prepared to stay on top of requirements regularly as seasons change.

Not only are you protecting your investment in your home, but you’ll save yourself money and time with utility bills and repairs.

We’ve outlined the top five Texas tips to preparing your home for the VERY cold winter months (should they occur in Texas!):

1. Tune up your heating and A/C system: hire a professional to come and change all the filters, and give your A/C and heating system a good once-over at least twice a year. Fall and Spring are great times before the extremes of super-hot or super-cold in Texas are reached.
2.  Check your roof: check your roof and hire a handyman to repair any loose shingles. This will help prevent costly leaks and help your energy bill, too.
3. Clean your gutters! Remove those leaves from the fall NOW to prevent clogged up gutters, leaks and ice dams from forming when and if the temps do drop.
4. Clean that chimney! If you have a fireplace – or any heating appliance burning gas, oil, wood or coal, you might need to contact a chimney sweep, or get a little dirty doing the job yourself. Making sure the chimney is clean will help prevent fires and prevent carbon monoxide from creeping into your home.
5. Store your mower and other lawn equipment: these machines need love in the wintertime too. Make sure they are routinely checked, started and stored with proper coolants and preventative measures to protect the engines and working parts.

There’s always Google, a handyman’s best friend – for amazing tips, and how-to videos to get things DONE. When it comes to your most important and valuable investment – you need to be sure that you have been on top of your game to keep your  home safe and in working order. Save yourself the headache of a repair or failure when you need something the most by staying ahead of the maintenance game.