5 Things You May Never Think Of But Need To Do To Keep Your Home Healthy
Being an adult is serious business- this is a lesson I learn multiple times a day. Apparently just because in my head I still think I am in high school (and, on more than one occasion, have accidentally driven to my old house instead of my current one while listening to 90's and 9 and completely forgetting that it is not, in fact, 1997 anymore...oh, and I still sometimes date checks 2003 but that is a whole other story...)
Anyway- apparently on top of paying bills, grocery shopping and raising kids, as a home-owning grown up (gulp) I also have to maintain my house. And unlike laser hair removal, spray tan, skincare and hair color upkeep, when it comes to home maintenance, I quickly realized I have no freaking clue where to begin. I know what I don't know- and I do not know sh*t about the inner workings of pipes and drains and HVACs, oh my.
According to Ernesto Ruiz from Homesquare, a genius home maintenance service (currently available in Fairfield County, CT and Westchester County, NY) that has saved my life several times over- there are 5 things that you for sure need to be doing regularly so your home doesn't fall to pieces. Since it seems very selfish for me to keep said things to myself, you can get the scoop in the video above, and I summarized the short list below as well since for me, if it isn't typed, screen-grabbed and saved on my iPhone, it may as well not exist:
1- Sump pump should be serviced 1-2 times a year. Because if it isn't working for any reason, your house could flood. And that would suck big time.
2- Gutters should be cleaned out 1-2 times a year, ideally at the end of the Fall. Make sure that they not only clean out the gutters that run along the roofline, but also the pipe that takes the water from the roofline and pours it into the ground. That can get clogged up with leaves and other debris- and if the water can't drain, even the cleanest gutters are irrelevant- because it is just gonna be a wet, annoying, drippy, destructive mess.
3- Drains and traps in your kitchen, bathrooms and laundry room need to be cleaned out. Because gunk- food, toothpaste, product- builds up, and eventually will start to smell. Really bad. And a girl can only burn so many Diptyque candles before it starts to feel excessive.
4- Ventilation registers- ya know, those rectangular shaped vents you see on the floor- need to be opened up and deep cleaned. They collect dust and allergens on a daily basis, and then basically recirculate them through the air which explains why sometimes my husband is convinced he is allergic to certain houses. They probably need to have someone come in and clean those puppies out. If you don't want to do them all, at least deal with the ones in common areas where you spend lots of time.
5- It is crucial- seriously- to have your dryer ducts and filters cleaned out yearly, 15,000 homes burn down from fires caused by lint-filled dryer ducts each year. That lint (which is kinda fun to pick out of the wire filter thingie in the dryer, at least in my opinion) is crazy flammable. So, combine that fact with the extreme heat from the dryer being pushed out through the duct, and you have what could potentially be a very dire situation. So get ahead of it.
Okay- there you have it- hope this was helpful. And if you have other questions, feel free to send them my way, or head on over to the Homesquare website.