Ready for Autumn? Try These 4 Fall Home Maintenance Tips

If you’ve walked anywhere in the past few weeks, you might have noticed we’ve been invaded by pumpkin spice. Starbucks announced that the Pumpkin Spice Latte has officially returned, which means that it’s officially fall.

It’s sad to pack away the pool floaties and swimsuits, but it’s also exciting to break out the flannels, pumpkins, and apple cider donuts. And (while it definitely isn’t as exciting as those things), it’s also time to break out your fall home maintenance checklist. 

As temperatures drop and we get ready to receive fall/winter storms, you need to do a few things to get your home as fall ready as you are. Keep reading for 4 simple maintenance tips to get started! 

1. Make Exterior Repairs

Fall (and winter, very soon) weather can do a number on your home. Moisture, fallen branches, and pounds of leaves can damage your roof, your foundation, your siding, your paint job, etc. 

Before things get bad, take a stroll around your house and inspect for anything that looks like it needs tending to. Make a list of exterior repairs you need done in order of urgency. Then, go through the list throughout the fall to have everything done before winter.

Some key things to take note of are your exterior paint and your roof with help from both a paint color specialist and a professional roofer, respectively. 

Any chips or fading of your paint signals that it’s time for a new paint job or at least some maintenance of your current coat. Chips or peeling paint can worsen during the months of autumn and winter, which can leave the wood underneath vulnerable to moisture and damage. 

It’s also unsightly and not a problem you want to handle when it’s freezing outside. 

Consulting with an exterior paint color consultant will allow you to choose the best paint to withstand the elements your home’s exterior experiences and elevate the aesthetic of your house in one fell swoop.

Paying attention to your roof is also of vital importance since roof collapse and general roof damages are most likely to occur during the fall and winter. Enlist the help of a professional to ensure your roof (and the surrounding area) is ready for fall and winter.

2. Clean and Check on Your Gutters

Gutters and leaves are far from a match made in heaven. However, it’s something you will deal with in the upcoming months and it’s something you need to stay on top of.

In preparation for falling leaves, clean out your gutters of any debris, sticks, and leaves. This leaves room for, well, more leaves, sticks, and debris. Be sure to stay on top of cleaning your gutters consistently as fall chugs along. 

Any clogs will allow rain and snow (yes, snow is on the way) to pool in your gutters. This can cause water to seep into your home’s roof and/or siding, which will cause immense and expensive damage.

3. Check for (and Repair!) Drafts and Gaps

A chill in the air outside is great after months of heat and humidity. However, it’s not welcome inside the house.

That being said, the chill will enter your home if you don’t seal any gaps and/or drafts throughout the house. Actually, it’s better to say that you’ll lose heat instead of gain a chill: heat loss through windows is what uses up 20-35% of your home’s energy.

This means caulking and re-caulking gaps in windows and doors. It could mean installing new windows, especially if they haven’t been updated or replaced in a while. It means weatherstripping and making sure to keep doors and windows closed.

This will keep the heat in your house and the cold out of it.

Besides drafts and gaps where air can seep in and out, you should also make sure to inspect for and block up any gaps where animals could enter your home. 

Animals like mice, rats, insects, birds, raccoons, and more get cold too! They’ll seek warmth wherever they can find it; make sure that warmth isn’t in your house, as this could lead to exposure to disease, damage to your home, and shrieks from family members as they see or hear scurrying feet under their bed.

4. HVAC Services

Speaking of heating your house, fall’s the perfect time for HVAC service and maintenance. If you have window air conditioners, wait for the last hot day of the season and then promptly store them away. 

After a summer of blasting the AC, you should also check your HVAC filters at the very least. You should also clean your vents, clean your outdoor unit (if you have one), and check on your heating system as you get ready for the cold. 

If you want to go above and beyond, give an HVAC specialist a call to look over your system and give everything a much-needed tune-up before winter sets in.

This could also be the time to upgrade or replace your system. While that isn’t going to come cheap, you could save hundreds of dollars on energy and power bills if you upgrade to energy efficient systems. You could also install a smart thermostat to prepare for the cold, which can also save you money.

These are just a few things to check off your fall home maintenance list for the upcoming season. The biggest tip is to keep your eye out for anything in need of repair so you can get it done before winter sets in!

Preparing to Sell: An Open House Checklist

In the age of the Internet, especially with the ability to see a home through a complete virtual tour, more people are using the online sources in order to “view” and find homes that they’re interested in buying more than any other method. However, don’t write off the classic open house quite yet.

A study conducted by Realtor Magazine showed that 20% of potential buyers looking at low- to mid-range homes use open houses to decide what home they actually want to purchase. That number jumps to 30% for luxury and upper price range homes.

This shows that there’s still value and advantages to holding an open house during your selling process. But this isn’t the end of that decision. Now, the real work begins.

An open house means allowing a large amount of strangers into your home in hopes that it will convince them it should become their home. The best way to do that is to make them feel comfortable, show them the best parts of the home, and help them visualize themselves living there.

How do you do that? A real estate agent is a great asset for planning, organizing, and staging your home for an open house since they’ve done this before and they know what the potential buyers are looking for. 

There are things you can do in order to prepare your home for an open house to make it as successful as possible. Keep reading for a brief open house checklist to help you get started.

Clean, Clean, and Clean Some More

Beginning a few days before the open house, it’s time to put in a little (actually, a lot) of elbow grease. You want to wash the floors, wipe down your windows/mirrors, clean the counters, vacuum, and more to make everything look “spick and spam.” 

Put in that little extra effort to really impress the potential buyers. Not only will the cleanliness make your home look and feel better, but it will also help you to highlight some of your home’s best qualities.

Does your home have amazing hardwood floors? Putting in that extra effort to make sure they’re buffed and shiny will highlight that attribute. 

What about a skylight window or large windows that overlook an amazing view? Ensuring that these are clear and streak-free will brighten the home and show off an awesome quality.

Don’t forget about cleaning the outside of your home, too. Power wash the driveway, mow the lawn, pick up any trash/twigs/branches in the yard, dispose of any dog poop, touch up any chipping paint, etc.

Remember Curb Appeal

On the topic of the outside of your home, curb appeal is extremely important for your open house. Curb appeal refers to the impression your home makes as someone looks at it from, well, the curb. 

The exterior of the home, your yard, your driveway, your fence, your mailbox — all of these make impacts on the first impression your potential buyers have of your house.

Take the time to get these things perfect. As we said before, wash your driveway, mow your lawn, keep up with your garden, and other cleaning tasks like that.

But you should also take note of the overall appearance. Has it been a while since your home’s gotten a fresh coat of paint? Consult with an exterior paint color expert to see whether a new color palette or even just some new trim can improve your home’s look.

Also make sure you maintain your pathways, update your plants, clean your gutters, and touch-up paint on your fences, railings, and mailbox.

Time for Some Fresh Paint

Speaking of paint, it’s a good idea to update (or at least think about updating) your interior paint as well. Color trends and themes have likely changed since you bought your house, not to mention that it’s likely there are scuffs, stains, and fading after the home has been lived in.

Think of colors and themes that are classic for the market you’re going for. Perhaps you’re aiming to sell to young families who will appreciate millennial pink. Or maybe, on the other hand, you’re aiming at older generations who prefer a more mature or simple color scheme.

This is where a paint color specialist will help you. They’ll be able to tell you what colors will work best for your market as well as which colors will make the rooms look their best. 

Color can increase light, highlight important aspects in the home, and add life to the space. A color expert will help you make those decisions and get your home in the best shape before the open house.

Create a Blank Slate

As you spruce up your home and make it look as good as possible, you also want to be creating as neutral of a space as possible. What do we mean by that?

We mean that you need to depersonalize the space. Take down your family pictures, remove specific or personal trinkets/decor, and have your pets/kids leave the home for the day of the open house. In fact, unless you’re selling the house on your own, it’s best that you not be present, either.

Some agents even ask homeowners to leave the premises completely during a property’s first listing weekend so the house can be clear for follow-up visits after an open house later on in the weekend or even the same day.

Potential buyers want to see themselves in the home. Seeing images of the current owners disrupts their visualization of themselves there, which can hinder their experience. Also, if you’re present, they may not be honest with how they feel or honestly inspect every aspect of the home for fear of offending you/your home.

Your best bet is to create a blank slate that will allow viewers to truly see themselves living there and start to feel like it’s their home.

Staging Services

It’s not easy to prepare your home for an open house, especially with work, kids, and life taking up most of your time. 

Staging services can help you set up your home in a way that will be best suited for selling. These types of services will help you arrange furniture, create that “blank slate” we mentioned earlier, place candles, remove decor/trinkets, and other things to create the perfect open house. 

It’s hard for the homeowner to take a step back and be unbiased when setting up the open house. 

Why should you remove your favorite art piece from the living room or rearrange your furniture in the bedrooms? You like it that way!

But staging services are experts and will be able to view each room with an unbiased eye to give you the best chance at impressing potential buyers.

Ready to Sell?

List open house checklist is far from comprehensive, but it does give you a general idea of the things you’ll need to think about and do in order to have a successful open house. 

The big things to keep in mind are: keep things tidy, keep things neutral, and make the potential buyers feel, well, at home! If you can do those things, you’re setting yourself up for a successful sale.