It’s time now to get ready for winter
It’s the time of year when you trade your T-shirts for a good geansai, your garden trowels for leaf rakes and your open windows for a roaring fire. And while the kids have visions of Hallowe’en and Christmas ahead, you’re envisioning sky-high heating bills, bursting water pipes and other havoc wreaked on your home by the plummeting temperatures.
As homeowners we’re often faced with the harsher realities of the changing seasons. Bad weather doesn’t just mean a day off school or work; it can also mean an overworked boiler, a power outage, even burst pipes. And let’s not forget about rising energy costs.
While we can’t always predict what Jack Frost will send our way from year to year, we can take a few precautions to ensure we spend less time cleaning up weather-induced messes and fretting over utility bills.
Most winter home prepping can be accomplished in a single, dedicated weekend. And you don’t have to spend a lot of money either; you just need to be smart about it. Here we’ll take a look at some ways to get your “ducts” in a row for the coming cold.
Did you know about one-third of the heat lost in a home finds its way to the outside through doors and windows? That’s a huge amount. Inefficient heating and insulation can drive up electric and gas bills just around the time you’re pinching pennies to afford Christmas gifts.
Windows are just bound to have gaps around them. The seal around the edges wears down or cracks over time with changing temperatures and a settling house. After a while, these gaps and cracks can let hot air out and cold air in (or vice versa during the summer). Use waterproof caulking or weather stripping to block the gaps and keep the heat inside where it belongs.
Drawing heavy drapes across sliding glass doors can also help keep heat inside your home.
Who wants to experience a winter without heat? It’s downright dangerous, so check out your house well before the first frost. Inspect your boiler, ducts, chimney, and pipes for leaks, cracks or broken parts. Perform any maintenance or energy-saving tasks, like insulating pipes, sweeping the chimney or changing the furnace filter.
To keep that precious heat from escaping through cracks, attach door sweeps to the bottoms of your doors. You can also use a draft stopper (also called a draft snake or a draft guard), a long fabric tube filled with rice or beans or an inflatable pouch that blocks the gap under a door.
Autumn is also a good time to change the batteries on your carbon monoxide and smoke detectors. Many fires and cases of carbon monoxide poisoning happen in the winter because people are using their boilers and other heat sources more often.
Last but not least, make sure you have your winter tools on hand. Haul out that shovel or blower, ice scraper, firewood and rock salt. You’ll be happy you set them aside when you open the door to a surprise fall of early snow.