Tips to Keep Your Home Cozy This Winter
Wintertime brings additional challenges to Manhattan homeowners with the city’s usual snow, ice, strong winds and plunging temperatures. Many of our clients live in brownstones, which presents unique problems due to the porous nature of the building material, allowing water to infiltrate the stone.
Top Hat Home Services provides ongoing home maintenance to prevent more costly and time-consuming issues from arising. There are special seasonal tasks we perform every winter to keep New York homes in like-new condition. These include inspection of the boiler, gas fireplaces and water heater. Here are a few other items on our checklist to keep the outside elements where they belong during northeast winters.
Keep the Pipes Flowing
Frozen water pipes are a leading cause of homeowner insurance claims, with approximately one in 60 insured homes submitted a property damage claim. Cleaning up the damage can cost tens of thousands of dollars. We recommend keeping your thermostat set to 55 degrees or higher during cold weather to avoid frozen pipes and appliances. You also want to keep faucets at a trickle to keep the water flowing, especially for sinks and showers that are furthest from the main valve. If you’re going to be away, take the extra step of opening kitchen and bathroom cabinets with water pipes to circulate the warmer air. Shut off and drain the outside water systems including outdoor kitchens and garden irrigation systems.
Clean the Gutters
The leaves are gone from the trees, but perhaps not from your gutters (unless you’re a Top Hat client!). If the leaves are not removed, gutters might overflow plus you could get ice dams, which cause major damage. When gutters overflow, water runs down the side of your house which can lead to increased deterioration and potential penetration into your home.
Test the Smoke and Carbon Dioxide Detectors
The start of the winter season is a great time to test and change the batteries on smoke and carbon monoxide detectors. This is especially important during the winter since most house fires happen in the winter as we’re blasting the furnace and using the fireplace. Closed windows also increase the risk of carbon monoxide poisoning. On the subject of carbon monoxide, we recommend an annual chimney cleaning to prevent smoke and CO² from flowing into your home.
Vacuum, Soak and Drain
It’s the little things that can sometimes cause the greatest damage. You use your refrigerator every day, but rarely do anything to keep it happily humming. Twice a year we vacuum the coils on the back or bottom of the fridge. This keeps the appliance running more efficiently, allowing the coils to release heat. If you don’t do this regular maintenance, it can shorten the life of the appliance, using more energy since your compressor must work harder than it’s designed to work.
Insulate
The U.S. Department of Energy says that by reducing drafts you can lower your annual energy costs by 20%. If you feel drafts around windows or doors, there are several solutions, such as spray foam insulation or caulking.
Fun Fact: Reverse the direction of your ceiling fan to rotate clockwise to save as much as 10% on energy costs. This pulls down warmer air so your thermostat doesn’t have to work as hard.
Here’s to a stress-free winter season for all you homeowners. We hope you get to spend more of this season enjoying a cozy home than caring for a cranky one. We’re here to help you enjoy every second.
Gary Mindlin is co-founder and owner of Top Hat Home Services, a full-service property care and management company. Top Hat services homes in Manhattan and are known as experts in every aspect of building management, maintenance and repair, as well as renovation and construction supervision.