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Your Rockford, Illinois Home’s Fall Checklist

With fall already here, it’s time for Rockford, Illinois homeowners to prepare their homes for winter weather. Here’s a fall checklist to help make sure your house is up for the challenge. Don’t leave your house’s health up to chance!

Perform a Heating System Inspection

It’s a good idea to have your heating system serviced by a licensed professional once a year. Heating systems will generally have fewer problems and run more efficiently with proper upkeep and preventive care. A good time to schedule a service is in the early fall, before the heating season starts. If you notice problems like noisy belts, erratic behavior, or a heating unit that just doesn’t seem to work the same as it once did, you might want to consider giving it a check-up before its yearly physical.

If something seems off, one thing you can check yourself before calling a professional is to make sure your furnace filter is clean. Axberg offers a preventive service maintenance program called The Crystal Club offering many helpful benefits.

Clean the Gutters

It’s important to keep your roof’s drainage system flowing smoothly to keep water away from your house’s exterior walls and foundation. Clogged gutters can lead to exterior damage or water in your basement. Clean leaves and other debris from the gutters, flush them with water, tighten the brackets if necessary, and cover the gutters with leaf guards to prevent future gutter clogging.

Improve the Air Quality in Your Home

Maintaining a gas heater is important in keeping the air quality healthy in your home. An improperly maintained heater can discharge carbon monoxide into the air, leading to illness. Make sure there are working batteries in the smoke detectors and carbon monoxide detectors. You should install a smoke detector on every floor of your house, including the basement. Finally, keep in mind that dirty air ducts could jeopardize your air quality. Have an Axberg professional test your air quality to decide what level of contamination you’re dealing with and how to correct it.

Winterize Air Conditioners

With winter approaching, you obviously won’t need cold air anymore. Take precautions to leave your air conditioner in a good spot before shutting it down for the winter, though. Preventive air conditioner maintenance keeps energy-efficiency, costs down, improved air quality, and more consistent cooling. Talk to a professional about what you need to do to winterize your Rockford home’s air conditioner.

Drain Outside Pipes

As fall settles in, your pipes become more at risk of damage from freezing conditions. It’s time to start thinking about storing garden hoses inside and shutting off outdoor water valves. Be sure to drain all hoses and pipes so water doesn’t freeze and expand breaking the pipes. Wrap pipes closest to exterior walls and in crawl spaces with pipe insulation or heating tape to prevent freezing. It’s also a good idea to make sure all of your pipes are in good working order to avoid pipe bursts in winter. If a pipe does freeze, try to thaw it out before it bursts.

Ready the Water Heater

Prepare for cooler weather by having a plumber drain the water heater and clear out any debris in the tank. Fall is a great time to do a little water heater maintenance to make sure you have hot water every time you turn on the faucet for the entire life of your water heater. And proper maintenance also can lower your water heating bill when costs are running at a premium.

Prepare for Electrical Outages

Fall brings a lot of erratic weather. Don’t be left in the dark! If your home is more than 10 years old, consider upgrading your electrical service panel to avoid power outages during fall storms. You may also want to think about installing a generator for backup electricity for when a power outage occurs.

If you own a home in Rockford, it’s inevitable that those mild fall temperatures will abruptly end and cooler weather will arrive. Make sure you prepare your house with routine maintenance and professional inspections by calling Axberg today at (815) 873-6003 so you don’t end up wishing you took precautions earlier!

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