Wonder why you’d need house maintenance tips? After all, you have owned a home for years (maybe built it from the ground up), surely you know what to do to keep your home great… Yet… There are two kinds of surprises: good ones, and bad ones. Unfortunately, when it comes to home ownership, there’s a shortage of stories of the owners discovering buried treasure under their home. We might not be able to provide any tips on how to make that more likely, but here are some good house maintenance tips to help you avoid some of bad surprises:
Have a house maintenance schedule (or maintain a schedule)
The most important thing about home maintenance is to do it. Having a schedule can help ensure this happens. A wide variety of schedules for home inspection are available for free on the internet (this one based on a list by The Art of Manliness is pretty good), all you’ve got to do is print it out and put it someplace you’ll see regularly. Now don’t skimp on actually doing these chores- each week get at least two of your checklist items done before letting yourself lounge around watching TV. Remember, should you ever find yourself needing to call on your homeowner’s insurance, your policy won’t pay for any damages caused by neglect.
House maintenance is all in the details
When conducting your inspections, don’t let things pass that shouldn’t- there’s a reason why you’re doing the inspections in the first place! Screw missing? Make a trip to the hardware store and get a replacement, and then screw in that replacement.
Bushes getting a little close to the foundation? Trim them back now, before they go from “a little close” to “a lot close”.
Faucet’s not leaking too bad? Make it not leak at all. Don’t look for excuses why you don’t need to do any work this time around, look for excuses to make your home amazing. Remember, you can either do something right, or you can do it again.
Make house maintenance a Habit
This post is obviously focused on the habit building part of house maintenance… There are hundreds of small tasks that need to be done in taking care of your house, and thousands of web pages that address each task specifically and provide house maintenance tips- but none of that will help you if you don’t actually do it, and do it right, and do it regularly.
The only way you’ll avoid a nasty surprise like a fire in your clothes dryer is if you’re regularly cleaning out the exhaust vent and hose. Don’t want to discover your heat doesn’t work on the first freezing cold day of late fall, or that your AC doesn’t work on that randomly hot day in spring? Then you’ll have to be conducting regular inspections and taking care of problems when they’re discovered.
In order to make regular maintenance a reality it needs to be a habit- part of your regular weekly life.
Like we mentioned before, don’t let yourself procrastinate when it’s time to get your maintenance tasks done for the week; but once you’ve done them, it’s time to feel proud and let yourself have some legitimate relaxation! The psychological carrot of a reward will help your mind subconsciously anticipate the routine, making it easier to motivate yourself to get it done. Now stop reading and get to it! Hopefully these house maintenance tips have motivated you to dive into work, because doing the work will build good habits much better than reading about it will!
As a full-service construction and remodeling company in San Diego, Collom Construction Inc. possesses the resources necessary for a successful project. We deliver products of quality craftsmanship and work with you to meet your needs and respect your budget.
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