Six Things You Should Fix In Your Home This Summer

There is no better time than the summer to fix any little, niggling issues that you might have with your home. It may be tempting to spend your summer weekends grilling outside or at the beach, and of course those things are a lot of fun and you shouldn’t miss out! But if you make sure your house is in tiptop shape this summer, then rest assured: you’ll be grateful for that foresight this winter. Here are some things that you should look into fixing…

The Guttering

Over the winter, most of us tend to experience more wet weather, which means that your guttering needs to be in excellent condition so that it can remove rain water from your property. This is something that you can hire a handyman to do, but if you’re confident in your ability to face heights and climb ladders without falling off, checking and fixing your guttering is definitely something you can do yourself. First of all, make sure that you remove any debris or dead leaves from the guttering. This can make the water in the guttering overflow and splash against the walls of your property, which can lead to leaks. Put on a pair of waterproof gloves to keep your hands clean and attach a bucket to your ladder to hold any sludge that you clean out. When you’re done, wash down the gutters using a hose. This will remove any final pieces of debris and it will also help you see any cracks in the guttering where the water is leaking through. If there are lots of holes or the gutters look generally dilapidated, it’s a good idea to look into getting new gutters installed. This will save your property from any leaks and prevent you from worrying about it over the winter. 

Drafty Windows And Doors

If you aren’t sure exactly which of your windows and doors have drafts, hold up a lit candle by them and watch to see if the flame flickers in a certain direction. If so, you may have a draft that will make your home icy cold this winter. Install double glazing if you can – and if not, you can use plastic weather stripping or rope caulk to keep the cold air out and the warm air in.

Your Insulation

Insulating your home is important both in the winter and the summer. During the summer, your house might get extra hot as heat leaks in from outside, while in the winter that heat can leak out, making your home cold and inhospitable. You can add insulation to your roof and loft using mineral wool insulation, which you can buy online or at hardware stores. Lay it between the joists at one angle and then across the joists at a right angle to build it up to the right depth. You can add a jacket to your hot water tank that will help to insulate it and keep it warm, and pipe insulation can be made from foam – even a cut-up pool noodle. This will ensure that your pipes don’t freeze over the winter – this can lead to leaks that can really damage your home.

The Landscaping

There are few times that are more pleasant to be outside than during the summer, so why not focus on your landscaping? This can be done even if you only have a small balcony or a couple of window boxes, or whether you have a vast garden. First of all, why not create a small herb garden? Buying some basic herbs like lavender, rosemary and mint will be fragrant, attract bees to your yard, and also be useful when you can use the herbs in your cooking. Add a border to your garden by removing the grass around the edges and laying large stones at the edge. You can buy small trees, bushes and flowers to plant – just make sure you add fertilizer to the soil and that you keep watering them. If you add evergreen plants and shrubs, your garden will look great through the winter too.

Remove That Dryer Lint

During the summer, we use our dryers a lot less – there’s something incredibly joyful about hanging wet clothes outside and bringing them in dry and smelling of sunshine. But in the winter, dryers are a necessity, so it’s important to take care of them. There are more than fifteen thousand dryer fires in the US every year and many of those fires are caused by trapped lint. If your clothes take a long time to dry or the dryer feels hot to touch, this may be an issue with yours. To remove the lint you need to unplug the dryer, pull it away from the wall and uncouple the connector before carefully cleaning out the vent with a brush or your hands. If the vent is big you can even use a leaf blower to clean it. You can also remove the front panel to clean lint out of there too.

Fill In The Cracks

If there are any cracks in the pathway up to your door or on your driveway, why not fill them in this summer? Over the winter the weather will be much more unpredictable, so it can be hard to put down new materials and hope they’ll stick. However, when it’s colder, water can get into those cracks and when it freezes, the water will expand – and so will the cracks, meaning that your drive or path will become more cracked and more unsafe and unsound over time. First of all, kill any weeds or grass peeking up through those cracks with a herbicide, and pull them up, before cleaning up the cracks of any debris in there. You can fill the cracks with crack filler before sealing them. Although they may not last forever like that, it’s a great easy fix for the winter before you may have to consider resurfacing the area.

Make sure your home is in perfect condition this summer so you can enjoy it all through the winter too.

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