Taking a Trip? Remember These Tips to Prepare Your Home
There are lots of things you need to do and remember in the days and weeks leading up to a vacation. For instance, there are basic things such as packing, planning, organizing your schedule, and booking flights. There are also more advanced items like creating itineraries and letting your friends and family know where you'll be and how to reach you.
And then there are the home preparation steps that many people overlook. But don’t worry, if you're planning a vacation and haven't thought about the home maintenance you need to take care of to prepare your home, that’s exactly what the following tips are for!
Preparing Your Home for a Vacation
Manage the Thermostat
Whether you're going for a winter getaway or for summer holidays, you can conserve energy and money during your vacation by managing your thermostat. Set it a little warmer or cooler than you typically like, depending on the time of year. This will help you save energy, so you aren’t cooling or heating an empty house.
Power Down Appliances
Appliances and electronics are handy and useful to have ready to go when you're home and using them all the time, but when they're sitting idle because you're away, they're actually just draining money from your bank account. Any appliances or electronic device that has lights or display panels is always drawing power so long as it’s plugged in. So instead of just turning off appliances when you leave, unplug them too. The same goes for the refrigerator and freezer—just make sure you eat all the food in them first, and prop open the doors to let them dry out.
Shut Off the Water
Your home will be susceptible to water damage from leaks, bursts, and floods while you're gone because there won’t be anyone around to ensure things are working properly. To avoid water damage, shut off your main water valve before you go. And don’t forget to drain excess water from the pipes by running the taps and flushing the toilets after the water is off.
Turn Down the Water Heater
You don’t want to waste money heating or cooling the entire house while you're away, so why waste energy to keep water hot? During your vacation, your water heater will come on regularly to use energy keeping water hot and ready for you unless you tell it otherwise.
Modern water heaters actually have a vacation mode that you can put them into, and this is a sort of sleep setting that will conserve energy. Don’t have a VAC mode? Don’t worry. Just set your water heater to the lowest setting or temperature.
Calling in the Experts Before You Go
If you're worried about the state of your house or your plumbing and water systems, give Anytime Plumbing, Inc a call for regular home maintenance, a pre- or post-vacation inspection, or other repairs and services.
You have enough to worry about with your vacation approaching without panicking about the safety of your Las Vegas, NV house, so call 702-362-9300 today if you have any concerns.
