Conducting a home maintenance schedule is very important for every homeowner in Michigan. You want to keep your home in perfect shape and everything at high-performance for the wide range of temperatures and weather conditions our homes face.
A checkup is always needed for heating and cooling appliances, the pipe system, drainages, or even your smart devices. This ensures that you are always informed on anything that needs repair or replacement so that you can avoid some unexpected breakdowns that might end up causing inconveniences in your home and cost you a lot of money to fix.
Below is a detailed maintenance checklist to help you identify the tasks for different seasons and all the repairs you should be doing on a monthly and yearly basis.
Seasonal home maintenance checklist
A Michigan seasonal home-maintenance checklist is essential because it helps your home cope with each season’s different climate changes.
Fall
This happens to be the best season to conduct all-around home maintenance. During this season, you can inspect all your internal and external home features and ensure they are running correctly. Some of the improvement tasks recommended for fall:
- Start by draining all your outdoor sprinkler systems. It’s advisable to winterize your sprinkler systems by the use of an air compressor immediately before it starts freezing.
- Winterize the gardens and mow the lawn. This will help your plants not to rot during extremely cold nights.
- Clean your interior kitchen appliances and check for any leaks or clogs in the pipe system.
- Clean the flues and vents off your chimney to give it a more refined look.
- Since cold nights bring water droplets, take this time to cover your air conditioning with waterproof covers.
- Ensure that you drain, clean, and cover your swimming pool if the season gets colder.
- Remove leaves from your lawn.
Winter
Winter causes the lowest temperatures of the year, and it’s important to make sure that they do not affect your home appliances and systems.
Pipe systems are the most affected ones since they end up freezing. This causes them to crack or even burst, and the impact can be felt for any home. The following are some items you should consider inspecting during the winter:
- Install a leak detector for your water heater system to ensure you don’t miss any leaks during this season.
- Check whether all the connection lines for both the internal and external holiday decorations are intact. Label the connections accordingly so that to verify the ones for outdoor and indoor use.
- Clean your freezer and refrigerator vacuum coils and drip pans. Only vinegar or baking soda should be used for this task. Any other cleaning materials might end up leaking harmful odors to your foodstuffs.
- In case a snowstorm had happened recently, ensure that you inspect your roof and gutters; the gutters are loose, it’s essential to fix and clean them.
- Since the holidays are almost here and you’ll end up using your oven and stove more, it’s advisable you clean your kitchen exhaust hood to avoid any air contamination.
- Clean all the drains in your showers, sinks, and tubs.
Keep an eye out for drafts as well, if your home has a lot of cold drafts you could be running up excessive heating and cooling bills throughout the year. If so, contact a local insulation contractor to see what your options are for air sealing your home.
Spring
Immediately after winter is gone, the ground and the weather are getting warmer by day. Trees are beginning to grow back their leaves, and the plants in the fields are beginning to blossom.
When all this is happening, it’s time you prepare your home for even warmer temperatures and do some necessary cleaning. The following are some of the things you could do to keep your home looking good during spring:
- After the windstorms that have been occurring, it’s time to inspect your roof for any loose shingles and any damage that might have occurred and could end up leading to leaks.
- Clean your sprinkler heads and get the water system back to work.
- Ensure that your fire extinguishers are in good shape, and in case they are not, consider replacing them with new ones.
- Inspect your electrical cord for any damage to avoid any electric shock or fires.
- Due to the rising temperatures, it’s time to have your air conditioning systems inspected by a qualified HVAC technician to have your home prepared for even hotter days and nights.
- Inspect your exterior faucets for any leaking or damages and fix them.
Summer
You want to ensure that all your home activities are running smoothly under the hot sun and the warmest weather. Now that you’ve taken care of most outdoor appliances and systems, it’s time to redirect your focus to indoor maintenance and repairs.
Here are a few things in your home you should have in check during the summer.
- Ensure you oil your garage-opener, door and hinges.
- Get an experienced trimmer to help you get rid of the dead trees and broad branches that might fall on your home.
- Inspect your wooden deck for signs of deterioration and, if any, replace the wood.
- Clean your kitchen appliances and refrigerator coils.
- Inspect your bathroom and kitchen sink for leaks.
- Ensure that your kitchen exhaust fan filter is cleaned.
Monthly-home maintenance checklist
By the beginning of each month, here are some items you should inspect;
- Clean your dishwasher screen.
- Wash and disinfect dustbins and trash cans.
- Ensure that your utility bills have not spiked suspiciously.
- Ensure that you clean your HVAC systems filters.
- Test your home security alarms
Annual home-maintenance checklist
Your annual home maintenance checklist should include these improvements:
- Service your heating systems to keep them in great shape.
- Ensure you clean and fix your gutters in case harsh weather was experienced.
- Get a dehumidifier to keep your home’s humidity levels in check.
- Get rid of any ice dams that might damage your roof in the long run.
Conclusion
It’s very important to keep up with your Michigan home maintenance checklist because it helps keep your mind at ease while also ensuring your home runs efficiently. It will also save you from the high costs of repair and replacements resulting from breakdowns.