In taking care of your home, doing small maintenance changes can save you a huge chunk of money later. Your home doesn’t come with a user manual like your car, so you need to become familiar with it while scheduling regular maintenance tasks for primary areas and noting your upkeep routine. A little maintenance coupled with regular monitoring will be a lifesaver. Here are home maintenance ideas to help you save money in the long run.
● Install a Programmable Thermostat
Programmable thermostats have been in use for many years, and they’re getting more advanced every day. You can purchase a basic programmable thermostat for your home, but you need to remember to set it and stick to the routine for best results. However, an advanced thermostat, such as the Nest learning thermostat, learns and adapts to your regular patterns and can then program itself. There are programmable thermostats that you can control remotely and wirelessly through a tablet or smartphone app.
● Clean the Gutters
Gutters direct water away from your house. However, if they are clogged with sticks or leaves, trapped water can damage the inside or outside of your house. Trapped stagnant moisture can make the wood on the roof of your home rot. It can also leak into the basement and foundation, causing extensive damage. Melting snow that is trapped in the gutters can freeze again, causing even greater damage to the roof. If your roof has suffered significant damage because of this, contact expert roofers in Richmond VA.
Clogged gutters can create a habitation for many animals and insects, and fixing these problems can be quite expensive, depending on the extent of the damage.
● Change Your HVAC Filters
Your air conditioner and furnace system filters trap dust and airborne allergens to enable you to breathe fresh air. You need to change these filters every few months while using your air conditioner or furnace. Regular changing of the air filters will significantly lower your utility bills because dirty filters make your HVAC system work vigorously, and it ends up using more energy.
● Check Your Smoke Detectors and Fire Extinguishers
House fires can cause extensive damage, so checking your extinguishers and smoke detectors is a crucial task to never skip. Ensuring you have protection against household fires begins with having a functional fire extinguisher and smoke detector.
● Keep Your Roof in Shape
It is vital to keep your roof in top condition. Periodically checking for damage and promptly replacing any discovered or worn shingles will eliminate the need to replace them. Focus on shingles around the skylights, chimneys, and vents because they are most susceptible to leaks.
● Seal Leaky Windows and Doors
Leaky windows and doors allow hot or cold air to enter, and this can escalate your heating and cooling bills. So, ensure your doors and windows close and seal properly, and that the latches are functioning well. If you have installed double-hung windows, both the lower and upper surfaces need to be locked so the window can close properly and seal tightly. Single pane windows are not very energy efficient compared to double-paned windows, but if you can’t switch them out, apply a window film instead. If you have drafty doors, apply weatherproofing strips to make your house conserve energy.
● Flush Your Water Heater
Flushing your water heater is a vital task that you should adopt as part of your regular home maintenance regimen. Flushing it at least once a year will help ensure you have an excellent hot water supply in your home and prevent sediments from corroding the components of your water heater. If not checked, corrosion can cause breakage that will cost you thousands of dollars to repair.
● Insulate Your Water Heater and Pipes
Your water heater can lose a significant amount of heat. You can determine if you should insulate your water heater by touching it. If you feel some warmth on the outside, you need to insulate it. It is easy to insulate your water heater. Just buy a pre-cut fiberglass insulation jacket for the heater and wrap the insulation material around it. You can also purchase foam insulators and wrap them around your hot-water pipes.
● Fix Leaking Faucets
A dripping faucet translates to throwing money down the drain. A faucet, dripping once a minute, ends up wasting 35 gallons of water annually according to the US Geological Survey.
You need to stay on top of many maintenance tasks, and these are just a few of them. You can perform these tasks regularly by committing to working on them for just a couple of hours a month, but they will go a long way in saving you a lot of money in the long run.
