Home Maintenance Tips to Save Your Life

  • @kw
  • 07 Apr 2020

If you are a house owner and want to live peacefully without worrying for every day botheration on maintenance issues, then reading this blog will help you with some essential tips that could save vital parts of your home the way we require regular care for our body. Overlooking and accumulating problems can end up with costing you a fortune!

In this blog I shall be discussing many relevant home maintenance tips and tricks for flats, bungalows or a farmhouse you cannot ignore if you wish to stay peacefully by maintaining low running costs and retail full value of your home.

Tips that could save your life

What if due to poor maintenance the gas pipe leaks, drain gets choked, roof slab gives way or a wall cracks? These are just some dangers that people do experience. In this section I am going to highlight some vital tips you need to know and take action on.

Checking Submersible Pumps

Normally the submersible pumps are in basement area and in case of flood situation and unless precautions are taken, it can damage foundation of the building. Thus it is important to test the pump at least every 6 months in the following way: 

1. Remove debris from the outside pipe

2. Restart the pump so to test if it’s running (unplug and plug it back in)

3. Pour water into the sump crock and ensure the pump starts running and pumps the water away.

Maintaining Clean Windows

Window wells are great for letting natural light into your rooms and providing ventilation. They also keep soil away from your window fixtures. If you have a room in the basement area, leaves and other debris can clog the drainage pipe, and after extended rainfall, the water pressure against your basement window will be intense. If you don’t clean the drainage, the water pressure can smash the glass and pour gallons of water inside. So, make sure you’re using a shorthanded shovel, a snake, or just your hands to pull out any blockages from the pipe.

Remove Mice Nest Near House Wiring

It’s not fun to have mice living with you, regardless of where they are. However, when they nest in places like your A/C units, garden machinery, and near electrical wiring, it can be disastrous.

Precaution Against Termites

Termites can become menace for wooden items in your house. Termite treatment is very important to save your costly furniture at home. Unless termites are completely remove, it spreads to other area even it can spoil the cemented area.

Termites pose a considerable risk to wooden homes, and without the proper precautions you could find yourself stepping out onto your porch and falling through it, or even finding out your entire home’s foundation has rotted away. Sometime the speading of termites is not visible from outer surface so if you have any doubts poke the wood with a screwdriver and check for weaknesses. If the wood is flaky or rotting, you might already have a problem that needs professional attention.

Placement of Lead Acid Batteries

Many home have gazettes like inventors connected to Lead Acid batteries. It is advisable that these batteries are kept in balcony or verandah away from the living room as batteries may cause toxic fumes when they get old and the spilling of battery acid may spoil the floor. Batteries should be kept on a plastic or any non acid reactive platform. These days however maintenance batteries are available, which are safe.  

Regular checking fire extinguisher

Fire extinguisher should be considered as an essential item to be installed in a house and common spaces and make sure that it is always in working condition. You do need to inspect it with a few things in mind. You should make sure: 

1. The fire extinguisher is accessible

2. The safety seals are intact

3. The pressure gauge is within normal parameters

4. There’s no damage to the extinguisher (e.g. corrosion, dents, leakage)

5. You’re documenting your inspections

In case of any fire from any source like gas stove, heater, electrical wiring etc. ,it can be disastrous in absence of a working fire extinguisher.

Clean Your Chimneys Yearly

If you have a home with a wood-burning fireplace — don’t let it become a danger. A buildup of dirt, birds’ nests or objects ending up in your chimney can easily catch fire and burn your house down. Not to mention, a chimney that doesn’t efficiently air the house out can cause a build-up of smoke or deadly carbon monoxide.

Simple Home Maintenance Tips That Save You Money

It is worthwhile making the home into most efficient living space it can be! These small checks can ultimately save substantial money in the process.

Regularly Clean Refrigerator Coils

Over time, all kinds of dust, grease, and dirt get stuck to the coils behind your refrigerator. It makes your appliance inefficient at best, dangerous at worst.

The coils are what your fridge uses to cool down, so if they are insulated, the fridge will have to work harder to get colder, or overheat. The best way to clean the coils is with a vacuum cleaner. Unplug the fridge, pull it away from the wall and find the coils. They should be either behind a metal plate at the back or behind the fridge under a grill lower down. They look like this:

Use the brush attachment of your vacuum, and work the grime away without forcing it. Use a cloth to gently wipe them down to catch anything the vacuum missed. There you go! Enjoy lower running costs and the reduced risk of a house fire.

Bleed Your Radiators Every Year

Don’t trust your radiators to maintain themselves! It’s likely they will need bleeding each winter to ensure they’re running at full efficiency. Bleeding a radiator gets the excess air out, and means the radiator can get warmer with less power consumption.

To bleed a radiator, release the valve and hold a rag underneath it to catch drips. You should hear air seeping out. When the sound stops, tighten the valve up.

Keep Your Gutters in Top Condition

Cleaning the gutters out is something no one really wants to do, but it can save you money on replacement gutters, and even on repairing roof damage. Clogged gutters can overflow and break, and put strain on the roof itself. In the winter, they can fill with ice that causes thawing damage or strains the material. You can get special gutter cleaning tools, or do it the old fashioned way:

  1.  Put on a long-sleeved top and rubber gloves
  2.  Steady the ladder against the side of the house
  3.  Scoop the dirt out with a small shovel
  4.  Dump it onto a tarp, not your lawn
  5.  Flush the gutters out with a hose

Seal Leaky Doors and Windows in Cold Places

Outwards facing windows and doors are prone to damage from the elements, which could cause the seals around the frames to rot away. When this happens, you’ll have a much tougher time heating your home because the heat will slowly seep away. If you’re waking up every morning to a freezing house, you’ll want to make this your number one priority. Even if you’re not, it’s well worth checking.

Have you found that the plastic seals around your windows and doors have withered? Your best bet is to replace it. It can be done quickly and cheaply:

Clean Your Kitchen Hood Filter

Depending on how much frying you do, hood filters can get clogged with thick grease quickly. In order to stop the grease getting inside the range itself, filters are designed to trap grease. If yours is doing its job correctly, expect to see something pretty awful…This isn’t the kind of cleaning you can do with a wet cloth, either. You’re going to need an agent to break down the grease. Here’s how you clean it:

  1. Pop the filter out
  2. Fill a bucket with boiling water
  3. Squirt in dish soap, and pour a 1/4 cup of baking soda
  4. Stir the bucket, then submerge the filter for 10 minutes
  5. Remove, scrub clean, and leave to dry

With a fresh hood filter, your range will extract steam and grease more efficiently, saving you money and possible replacement costs for the range.

Run Water Through Your Fixtures

When toilets and sinks aren’t used regularly, grime can build up in the pipes and faucets. If you have a bathroom you don’t use very often, make sure to run water through the systems at least once a quarter to keep the flow coming smoothly and reduce future clogging.

Check Air Filters At Least Once a Month

Changing your HVAC air filters regularly can cut energy bills by 5-15%! Plus, if you live in an area with lousy air quality or pollution, you need to keep the filters fresh to stay safe. Swapping out filters is easy. There’s no cleaning to be done, so just take the old one out, dispose of it, then slot the new one in its place.

Give Your HVAC A Complete Tune-Up

Make sure you AC is functioning at peak capacity by getting an HVAC tune-up at least once a year. You might not know exactly if and when you need this, so it’s safest to schedule it annually in advance or risk your unit breaking down on the hottest day of the year.

Get Annual Maintenance Contract done for your Water Filter

Water filter is an essential item for every home. The AMC helps you to have minimum botheration. Some time in absence of AMC the replacement of parts may cost high.

Check Your Toilet Cistern for Leaks

Leaks account for 12% of all water use, and it’s often the toilet that’s at fault. If you want to save on your water bill try this:

1. Remove the lid on the tank

2. Drip 10 drops of coloring into the tank. Replace the lid

3. After 15 minutes, look in the bowl Is the water in the bowl colored? If so, you’ve got a leak and need to replace the flapper. 

Here’s how to fix it:

1. Turn off the water supply by turning the valve located behind the toilet

2. Remove the lid and flush

3. Mop out excess water with a sponge

4. Remove the chain from the lever

5. Slide the faulty flapper up and off the overflow tube.

6. Replace the flapper, re-hook the chain, turn on the water and test again

Conclusion

Owning a house is wonderful, but it doesn’t come without the responsibility of home maintenance tasks. In this article, we put together a comprehensive list of home maintenance tips, but we wouldn’t expect you to remember all of them. For your convenience, our team has created a home maintenance checklist that you can download and use to make sure you’re taking great care of your property on an annual basis.

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