Spring home maintenance checklist

Start outside, while the damage is still visible

Winter damage is easiest to see right after winter. A caulk line that split in January is obvious in March and invisible by July, once dust has settled into it.

• Clean the gutters and downspouts. The first job, because everything else outside depends on water leaving the roof properly. Twice a year is the usual cycle and this is one of the two.
• Inspect exterior paint and caulk. Look at trim, corners, and where windows and doors meet the wall. Peeling paint and split caulk are where water gets in, and the south and west faces weather fastest.
• Look at the roof from the ground. Missing or lifted shingles, a sagging line, debris in the valleys. Binoculars are the right tool for this, not a ladder.
• Walk the foundation. New cracks, soil that has settled away from the wall, ground that slopes back toward the house rather than away from it.
• Check the driveway and paths. Water that got into a crack and froze is what turns it into a pothole. Sealants have their own temperature and cure rules, and the label is the place to read them.
• Trim vegetation back off the siding and roof. Branches touching a building invite both pests and moisture.

Get the cooling side seen before the first hot week

Every service company in the region is booked solid on the first genuinely hot day. Nobody is booked in April.

• Book the annual system service. Spring for cooling, fall for heat. Off season means shorter waits and, often, better prices.
• Change the filter and start counting again. Cooling season is when filters actually get used.
• Reverse the ceiling fans. Counterclockwise for summer, clockwise for winter.
• Clear the area around the outdoor unit. Leaves, cuttings and anything stacked against it over winter.
• Clean the vents and registers. Vacuum the supply and return grilles and make sure furniture hasn't been moved over one.
• Look at the condensate drain before the first cold air. A cooling system pulls water out of the air and sends it down a narrow pipe that grows algae over an idle winter. Standing water in the drain pan, or a damp patch near the indoor unit on the first hot day, means it's already backing up.

Water, indoors and out

• Turn the outdoor faucets back on and watch each one run. A pipe that split over winter often only reveals itself the first time it's under pressure again. While you're there, look at the vacuum breaker on the spigot, the small cap on top that stops hose water siphoning back into the house. They crack in a freeze and drip when the tap is open.
• Test the sump pump before the thaw, not after it. Empty a five gallon bucket into the pit and watch the float rise, the pump start and the water clear. A gallon or two won't lift the float in most pits, so a small test can look like a failed pump. The one week it genuinely matters is the week the ground gives up its snow.
• Check under every sink and around the toilets for damp, staining or a swollen cabinet base.
• Run the fixtures nobody uses. A guest bathroom left alone all winter has a dry trap by spring.
• Look at the water heater. Rumbling, a shorter run of hot water, or anything at all on the floor around the base.

The ground

Spring is the window for most of the lawn and garden work, and the timing depends on your grass rather than the date.

• Aerate the lawn while it's actively growing. Late spring into early summer suits warm season grasses, once the soil has genuinely warmed. Cool season lawns are better aerated in fall. Mark irrigation lines first, and call before you dig.
• Feed during active growth, not dormancy. Over feeding burns grass and runs off into waterways, and the product label gives the rate for your lawn.
• Refresh the mulch in the beds. Two to three inches, kept back from trunks and stems.
• Prune what should be pruned now. Late winter and early spring suit most structural pruning, but spring flowering shrubs set their buds last year, so pruning them now costs you the flowers.

What can wait

Not everything belongs in spring, and trying to do the whole year in April is how a maintenance habit dies in its first season.

Patina carries this list as separate tasks, each on its own interval, so next March you're not rebuilding it from a web page.

Seasons here are northern hemisphere, as they are throughout the app.