Comparing the different seasons of the year, you could tell that fall would really be the best time to perform regular maintenance on some of the hardest-working devices in your rental property. Take advantage of this time. When you do the important interior maintenance items during this season, you’re also getting your property ready so everything keeps running safely and smoothly all winter long. You can have your filters, batteries, and water heaters checked and cleaned or replaced. These things need to be done regularly to keep your tenants safe and your rental property operating in optimum condition.
Replacing your West Bend rental property’s air filters regularly is very important. These filters keep your property’s HVAC system clean and running efficiently. Because of this, changing the air filters in your rental home is an important part of seasonal maintenance. As the winter months draw near, and people choose to stay indoors more, they’d want to keep out the cold. They crank up the heat and the furnaces start working harder. This is why keeping your filters clean is crucial. There are a variety of HVAC systems and they use different kinds of filters. Depending on what filter your particular system needs, you may need to change the filters as often as every 30 days, every three months, or even every six months. You may think that this is a task that you can delegate over to your tenant. But chances are they’re going to forget to do it or not change the filters often enough. This neglect in maintenance will put a strain on your HVAC system and will result in its life being shortened and the efficiency of the unit reduced.
Fall is also the best season to test and change the batteries in your rental property’s smoke and carbon monoxide detectors. These devices need to be functioning properly to ensure the safety of your tenants. For instance, there’s a fire and one of your tenants gets hurt. Then the investigation shows that one of your smoke detectors wasn’t functioning properly because it ran out of batteries. What’s going to happen next? It’s almost a certainty that you’d be getting sued. So, to put it differently, it’s critical that these devices are kept functioning properly.
There are multiple types of smoke and carbon monoxide detectors. Some of them have batteries that need to be changed every six to twelve months while others can last up to the full useful life of a smoke or carbon monoxide detector— which is ten years. However, in spite of the kinds of batteries your devices may have, you should still see to it that the batteries are being tested on a regular basis and replaced when needed. Hundreds of people are injured or killed in house fires every year. Some of these tragedies could be attributed to the smoke detectors in their homes not going off when it should have. If you let this task fall into the hands of your tenants, how sure are you that they would do it and do it every time? Instead, they may damage your property’s smoke detectors as they try their hand in testing and checking them. This would just give you additional expenses in replacement costs and increase your liability.
Then we have water heaters. They are often forgotten when doing property maintenance tasks even though they are one of the most frequently used devices in a rental home. It should not be neglected. It is important to clean your rental property’s water heater so it continues to work efficiently for a long time. Over time, sediment builds up in the tank of a water heater, making it less efficient and even leading to clogged water lines.
You can steer clear of these problems easily by simply flushing your water heater once every six months or so. It may take a while to get it done, but it’s important to still do it. It’s how you can get the most out of your expensive water heater unit. This may also be a task you’d normally want your tenants to do themselves. But the truth is that they might not do a good job. There really is no guarantee that they will clean out the water heater properly and may just end up causing more harm than good.
Neglecting these maintenance items can have serious consequences and you may end up paying a lot more on expensive repairs. But letting your tenant change or clean the filters, batteries, and water heater in your West Bend rental property is not the best option. While it may be the case that you could spend your time and energy to do the jobs yourself, the best choice would still be to employ a company like Real Property Management Greater Milwaukee to do all the property maintenance tasks for you. Our full range of maintenance services can do wonders for you. It can keep your property at peak shape and ensure the safety of your tenants. With us working for you, you would have more time to focus on growing your real estate investing business. For more information, contact us today.
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