Making Sure Your Home Is Ready For The Change Of Seasons

2021-08-31
By: Advocate Brokerage

luxury home fall

Pumpkin Spice has already hit the Starbucks menu so we thought we might as well start talking about the things you can do around your home to help you make it through the Fall Season claim-free!

Outdoor Tips To Get Your Home Fall-Ready:

Clean your gutters and downspouts. All water should be flowing AWAY from your home.
Repair any cracks or loose stones in all walkways leading to and from your home.
Upgrade lighting on walkways to prevent the risk of slips, trips, or falls.
Make any necessary repairs to steps or railings leading into and out of your home. You want to ensure the safety of any visitors, especially when the first frost of the year comes our way.
Trim or bring in a professional to trim any tree branches near your home that look dead, weak, or damaged. Strong winds can cause weak branches to break causing major damage.
Replace any damaged weather stripping and do any necessary re-caulking around doors and windows.
Seal your deck and check for any wood rot

Indoor Tips To Get Your Home Fall-Ready:

Schedule service and clean your heating equipment such as your furnace, chimney, and generator. You don’t want to wait until you need them to find out there are issues. Plus with some of the delays we are hearing about in the supply chain, it is in your best interest to be proactive!
Replace the air filters in all your HVAC equipment as well as filters in your humidifier.
Test your smoke and carbon monoxide detectors. If they are battery-operated, be sure to change the batteries. We strongly recommend that you have a central station fire and burglar alarm installed in your home; it’s a great time to get this important protection in place.
Make sure you have a fully charged fire extinguisher on every floor of your home.
Clean your dryer of lint. Dryer lint is one of the leading causes of house fires, so making sure your dryer is free of as much lint as possible is important.
Check the drip pans under any appliance that uses water. If they are cracked, damaged or if you don’t have one, now is a great time
to have it replaced or installed. Drip Pans can be installed under water producing appliances to catch leaks including your water heater, AC, dishwasher or washing machine.
Check for any cracks in your dishwasher or washing machine hose. If they are more than 5 years old, you should have them replaced. We would also suggest that you consider upgrading them to reinforced steel-braided hoses.

Providing valuable information for our clients is important to the team at Advocate Brokerage! We are here to help our clients with questions regarding their home, auto, or commercial insurance and help with the claims process in any way we can. Please do not hesitate to contact us should you have any questions or concerns.