5 New Year’s Resolutions for Your Home

Being a homeowner is a rewarding experience. But along with the joy and satisfaction that comes with turning a house into a home, also comes a laundry list of maintenance tasks you have to keep up with throughout the year.
Fortunately, the new year is an opportunity to regroup, so as you’re setting those personal goals and ambitions, consider adding these five proactive and preventative tasks to your list of New Year’s resolutions:

1. Conduct a Thorough Home Inspection

Begin the new year with a solid understanding of what areas in and around your home may require work, improvements or replacement. Conduct a thorough interior and exterior inspection of your home, which will help you plan and budget for any additional home improvement costs on the horizon for 2021 and beyond.
Exterior checkpoints should include major entry points such as the garage and doors, as well as vital systems like drainage, gutters and the health and safety of your roof. Throughout the inspection, make note of the last time these areas were serviced and any wear and tear you’ll need to monitor in the new year. Snap photos along the way so you can compare and contrast as the year rolls on.
Looking inward, when inspecting the interior of your home, check things like your foundation, fireplaces, windows, plumbing, electrical and heating and cooling. Again, make note of the last time these home systems have been serviced or looked at by a professional and if any systems are showing areas of decline. If something doesn’t look right, isn’t working or you’re unsure, consult a professional for advice. For any heating and cooling system questions or concerns, enlist a Rheem Pro, who can offer expert help and guidance.

2. Organize Your Home Appliance and System Files

Whether it’s your refrigerator, washer and dryer, or heating and cooling system, your owner’s manuals provide valuable product information that can save you time and money—from how different settings work, how to diagnose and fix malfunctions, how to get a replacement if a part breaks and much more.
So, if you’ve ever become frustrated when you run into an issue with one of your appliances, and the owner’s manual is nowhere to be found or lost in a sea of clutter, organizing should be high on your list of resolutions this year.
Begin by collecting all the appliance and product manuals, warranties and receipts around your home. Go through the stack and throw away the files you no longer need, like for products you no longer own or simple and inexpensive products where manuals aren’t necessary. Keep manuals for your complex and more expensive appliances.
Next, use large binders or a small filing cabinet and start sorting. If your appliances have multiple pages, clip everything together and use folders and dividers to sort into categories that make sense for your assortment of products and appliances.

3. Make Your Home More Eco-Friendly

If one of your New Year’s resolutions is to be more environmentally conscious, start in your home by investing in sustainable practices and products.
Simple actions, like swapping lightbulbs for long-lasting LED bulbs, using less paper products or air drying more of your laundry instead of using the dryer are easy ways to start living a greener lifestyle. Another way is to invest in sustainable appliances across your home.
If you’re planning to make any large appliance or small product purchases this year, look for an ENERGY STAR® certification, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s unbiased label for energy efficiency. If you’re in the market for new heating or cooling solutions, Rheem offers ENERGY STAR®-certified products that are designed to help you use less energy and save you more money.

4. Update Outdated Appliances and Invest in Smart Technology

If properly taken care of, the lifespan of home products and appliances can be long. But if you’re living with outdated appliances, it could be costing you. Not only can outdated appliances decrease your home’s value, but they also pose potential safety risks and provide little to no functionality.  
If you’re looking to improve and simplify your quality of life, consider investing in smart technology across your home, from connected kitchen appliances to smart security solutions to even on demand temperature control with WiFi-enabled thermostats.  
A growing number of Rheem’s heating and cooling products use EcoNet® Smart Monitoring System sensor technology, which offers streamlined protection, comfort and energy savings. Through an app downloaded on your smart phone, users can receive maintenance and care alerts and have remote control access at their fingertips.

5. Commit to a Seasonal Maintenance Plan

Creating and committing to a seasonal maintenance plan is key to the upkeep of your home. While regular interior and exterior inspections of your house can identify the overall condition and any problems, ongoing maintenance can prevent future issues from happening and makes your investment worthwhile.  
At the start of the new year, put together a list of maintenance tasks to tackle at the start of spring, summer, fall and winter. Each seasonal change brings new challenges and opportunities for homeowners to tackle cleaning tasks, repair and replace failing or outdated systems and schedule any needed maintenance appointments. For example, HVAC systems should typically be serviced during the spring season to help ensure your unit is ready for summer and again in the fall, as you prepare to close the windows and turn on the heat.
To ensure your heating and cooling systems are suited to serve you without disruption in 2021 and beyond, visit our website for detailed product information and schedule a check-in with your local Rheem Pro.