How to Prepare Your Saugeen Shores Home for Winter

Posted Sep. 30th 2011 under Real Estate Tips

As the winter season approaches it's time to start thinking about preparing the inside of your house for the season. Beyond the usual preparations for the change in temperature and worrying about a drafty house, it's also important to consider the fact that the winter season means spending a lot more time indoors.

In the winter time, the furnace is the heart of your house. Before you do anything else, make sure you check your filter. If it's old and dusty, you can either clean it or replace it. If your house runs on forced air, you should spend the money to get the ducts vacuumed. By doing this, you will get rid of the previous year's dust, pet dander and other dangerous build-ups.

Next, make sure you've got a good carbon monoxide detector. If you've got one already, make sure it works - you don't want to endanger yourself or your family with faulty safety equipment.

You'll also need to take humidity into account. Check the humidifier in your furnace to make sure it's not clogged with scale build-up. If it is clogged, you can clean it with a de-scaler or replace the filter entirely.

Before you begin sealing up your house for the season, you may want to give your house or apartment a really good cleaning. Get into those small, dusty areas and scrub them well, this way you can start your indoor season with a fresh, clean environment.

As you start to pack away all of your summer clothes and unpack all your winter gear, make sure you put some cedar balls in your drawers and cedar blocks in your closets. They have a much nicer scent than mothballs and they will keep the pesky moths away from your knitwear.

Keeping warm in the winter means ensuring you keep the heat inside. This means weatherproofing your doors and windows.

Doors

• You can install a sweep along the bottom of all your doors. The sweep screws into the door and it has a rubber edge that makes a seal, which stops the draft from coming in under the doorway.
• You can apply "sticky foam" (like tape) to the inside edges of the door trim. Doing this will seal up the doorway against the winter winds.
• You can purchase weather-stripping, which screws onto the outside edge of the doorway.

Windows

• You can purchase removable caulking. Make sure you read and follow the instructions because when the spring comes around, you don't want to ruin your walls and/or windowpanes when you remove the caulking.
• You could also purchase removable draft seal, which is also like tape. Simply tape up your windows in the winter, and peel the tape off in the spring.
• the old standard plastic (apply by blow-drying) is also an option. If you don't want to seal up your windows, you can always avoid window drafts are by making use of window coverings like heavy drapes or blinds.

Now, don't seal up all of your windows! Make sure you can still open one or two because even thought it might be cold, it's still important to get some fresh air inside every now and again.

After all this your space will be warm for the season. Now, why not make it cheerful?

Buy some potpourri or beeswax candles (which naturally keep areas dust free), and green up your space with some plants, which add some much needed oxygen to any house.

Through keeping a warm, comforting and energy efficient house, you'll be able to beat away the winter blues!