The Fall Home Maintenance Checklist: Nine Jobs Before the First Freeze
Almost every expensive winter repair — burst pipes, water down an interior wall, a boiler that dies in January — starts as a small autumn job that nobody did.
Here are nine, in the order that matters. Most cost nothing but an afternoon.
What you'll need
- A stable ladder and someone to foot it
- Gloves, a bucket, a stiff brush
- Foam draught strip and a tube of exterior caulk
- Fresh batteries for smoke and carbon monoxide alarms
1. Clear the gutters (after the leaves finish falling)
Blocked gutters overflow, and overflowing water runs down the wall, freezes, and finds its way inside. Scoop the debris into a bucket, then flush with a hose and watch where the water actually goes.
Do this once the trees are mostly bare, otherwise you'll be doing it twice.
Tip: Never lean a ladder against the gutter itself — it bends. Rest it against the wall or use a ladder stand-off.
2. Shut off and drain outdoor taps
Water left in an outside tap or hose bib expands when it freezes and splits the pipe — often inside the wall, where you won't discover it until spring. Turn off the indoor shut-off valve, open the outdoor tap to drain it, disconnect and store the hose.
3. Find the draughts on a windy day
- 1Walk the house and hold the back of a damp hand near door and window frames.
- 2Mark every spot you feel cold air moving.
- 3Fit self-adhesive foam strip to frames and a brush strip along the bottom of exterior doors.
- 4Seal the loft hatch and the letterbox.
- 5Leave air bricks, extractor vents and anything serving a gas appliance completely alone.
Tip: Draughts are uncontrolled air. Ventilation is controlled air. Sealing a purpose-made vent creates damp — and, with a fuel-burning appliance, real danger.
4. Test the heating before you need it
Run the heating for twenty minutes in October, not on the first cold night in December when every engineer in town is booked. Listen for banging, check every radiator heats evenly, and bleed the cold-at-the-top ones with a radiator key.
5. Change the furnace or boiler filter
A clogged filter makes the system work harder, costs you money every month, and shortens its life. Filters are cheap and take two minutes; note the size on the old one before you shop.
6. Test smoke and carbon monoxide alarms
Heating season is carbon monoxide season. Press the test button on every alarm, replace batteries, and replace any smoke alarm over ten years old — they expire whether or not the battery is fine.
Tip: There should be a CO alarm on every floor with a fuel-burning appliance, and one near the sleeping areas.
7. Seal the gaps outside
Walk the perimeter and look for gaps around pipes, vents and window frames. Fill anything you could push a pencil into with exterior caulk or expanding foam. It keeps out water, cold and the mice that come indoors in the first cold week.
8. Reverse the ceiling fans
Most fans have a small switch on the motor housing. Run them clockwise on low in winter and they push the warm air that's collected at the ceiling back down the walls, for the cost of nothing.
9. Know where your stopcock is
The main water shut-off is the most useful thing in the house and nobody can find it in an emergency. Locate it now, make sure it actually turns, and tell everyone in the house where it lives.
Tip: If it hasn't been turned in years, turn it a quarter and back a few times — seized valves are common and better discovered in October.
Common mistakes to avoid
- Going up a ladder alone, on soft ground, in wind. Most home-repair injuries are ladder injuries.
- Sealing air bricks and vents while draught-proofing.
- Leaving the hose connected to the outdoor tap over winter.
- Waiting for the first cold night to find out whether the heating works.
- Doing anything with gas or main electrics yourself. Those two jobs go to a qualified professional, always.
Want someone to show you?
Not sure what you're looking at up there? Show a home-repair teacher on a live video call and get a plain answer before you spend anything.
