First-Time Homeowner Checklist: 4 Important To-Dos For Spring That You May Not be Thinking About

Congratulations on your new home! There’s nothing better than the feeling of buying and taking care of your own house. With a new home, comes new responsibilities. Along with the obvious maintenance tasks like mowing and mulching, there are also a few things that we recommend our first-time homebuyers take care of during the spring months. Here are our top four tasks to do while tackling your regular spring cleaning that you may not be thinking about.

Clean Out Outdoor Lint Trap
Laundry is simply one of those things we don’t think twice about, but frequent laundering yields consequences that the average homeowner may not be aware of. Outdoor lint traps have a bad habit of getting clogged up, which can contribute to laundry room fires. In fact, this is the second leading cause of home fire damage. 

Cleaning out your outdoor lint trap is a great way to avoid this danger. I recently visited a home whose dryer wasn’t working properly. After examining the outdoor lint trap, we noticed a huge collection of lint hiding in the vent tube – an extremely dangerous problem to have. 

Remove the lint and clean your outdoor lint trap with a wire brush and wipe down the cover with a little bit of dishwashing liquid and warm water. Your home will be cleaner and safer for it. 

Give Your Home a Safety Inspection
Speaking of the potential for home fires, one of the things you should do as the season comes around again is to give your home a safety inspection. 

Don’t know where to start? Test your smoke and carbon monoxide alarms and replace any batteries. 

Other great things to add to your list:

• Locate your home fire extinguisher and be sure other members of your household know where to access it in case of a fire
• Add security lighting and cameras to avoid any intruder issues
• Inspect and clean gutters and downspouts to avoid deterioration before spring rainstorms

Hire an Exterminator

Spring is a very active time for pests. Hire an exterminator to stop any potential problems before they even start. Just make sure your exterminator looks in any crawl spaces for termites and other similar insects. These are often the most damaging and costly, so you don’t want to accidentally overlook them.

Service Your Air Conditioner Unit
Servicing your AC during your spring cleaning is the best way to ensure that your unit will be running strong come summer. Change your air filters, remove any debris around your unit, check that your refrigerant lines are well-insulated, and you should be good to go. If your AC is making a noise or seemingly not working as it once did, give a professional a call to ensure that your system is working properly before it starts to get too warm. 

As real estate agents and homeowners, we want to ensure that our first-time homebuyers are ready for anything that comes their way this spring. If you have any questions about this or are looking into buying your first home, the Scott Garnett Team is here to help!