Preparing your Home for Winter

Preparing your Home for Winter

Have you noticed the crispness in the air lately? Friday was the first day of Fall and the days are getting shorter! It's time to start working on getting your home ready for Winter. Here are a few easy things that you need to look at and consider before Old Man Winter arrives!

Caulk is like weatherstripping in a tube. Check the caulk around all the windows and doors. You don't want there to be any gaps. You should also look at the other transition places like where the masonry joins the siding or where vents or other objects protrude from the walls. You want all these places to be tight.

Speaking of Weatherstripping. Check the weather stripping around all exterior doors. This is one of the largest sources of heating loss. If it's torn or missing, you'll want to replace the entire piece. Adhesive-backed foam pads are easy to install for this purpose.

Older windows often require weatherstripping to keep drafts out.

If you like to have woodburning fires in the winter. Now would be a good time to call a chimney sweep before they get really busy.

This is also a good time to check the insulation in your attic and crawl space. You can purchase loose-fill to beef up what's already there. You can also have it professionally blown in.

Your yard may or may not have taken a beating with our hot summer this year. Now is a great time to plant trees and aerate and over seed the lawn. Aerating promotes healthy growth and over-seeding fills in those places that are bare.

Once everything's done, you can relax and enjoy the winter months!