Take These Steps To Winterize Your Home

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Winterize Your Home1

Winter is characterized by freezing temperatures, ice, snow, and other elements that can destroy your house and increase your energy expense. Therefore, you need to start preparing your home for the winter season early enough to avoid all these issues altogether. Once you put in place these measures, you’ll be able to run your home a lot more efficiently and affordably.

If you don’t know of the steps to take to winterize your home, worry no more. Here’s a guide detailing all you need to do to safeguard your home during winter, thereby save yourself from financial damages and personal injury.

1. Change Your Home’s Furnace Filters

One of the first things you need to do when winterizing your home is changing the furnace filters. Doing this is vital because clogged and dirty air filters usually strain the HVAC unit. And to avoid this altogether, it’s advisable to keep installing new filters monthly. This way, you’re guaranteed the smooth and efficient running of the HVAC unit. Moreover, it saves you the costs of having to do expensive repairs should the HVAC unit get destroyed during winter.

Change Furnace Filters

2. Inspect Your Home To Check For Cracks Or Leaks

When preparing your home for winter, you must inspect both its exterior and interior to see whether you’ll find any leaks or cracks. Your home areas that require scrutiny are the concrete foundation, window sills, broken window locks or lathes, and stucco exterior.

If there are cracks, seal them using suitable methods such as caulking. And while the caulking technique is simple, it’s very effective in stopping the passing of cold air because it plugs up the open seams, cracks, and holes surrounding your home. The material used when caulking is either an expanding-foam sealant or an acrylic-latex caulk. This way, you’ll be able to seal any gap through which cold air might be finding its way into your house.

3. Clean The Gutters

You also need to make sure your gutters are clean before winter. It’s essential always to do this because dirt, leaves, and other materials start pilling on your home’s roof. And when winter sets in, this will result in ice and water buildup on the roof. Although this might not look like something serious, it causes the gutters to warp or bend after the roof’s materials become too heavy. This affects the stability of your gutters, making them prone to detaching from your home’s roof, causing an overhead hazard.

Clean The Gutters

4. Add A Layer Of Attic Insulation

Another effective strategy for preparing your home for winter is by adding insulation in your home’s attic. It’s recommended you always do this because many homes’ attics come with either little or no insulation. But this isn’t advised since homes need to have insulation between 10 to 14 inches thick.

When adding attic insulation to an existing layer, never use insulation, which might be a vapor barrier. Otherwise, you risk prompting the moisture buildup that ultimately leads to mold growth. Moreover, with enough insulation, the heated air in the underneath rooms won’t find its way into the attic.

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