Summer's Over: Ways to Maintain Your Home's Exterior After Summer

As the relaxing days of backyard barbecues turn to thoughts of school and work mentality, your home needs to prepare for the change of seasons. Summer fun, sun and nature have a significant effect on a home’s exterior. Although end-of-summer maintenance items are not necessarily as labor intensive as many spring tasks, these are strategies that can reduce repair costs and keep your home looking beautiful.

1. Monitor and Clean Gutters: A house’s gutters accumulate more debris during spring and summer than many realize. Buildups of airborne dust and other particles can form a hard layer in your gutters, reducing their ability to drain roof water. Add early foliage into the mix, and that could be a recipe for disaster. Check your gutters for sediment and breakup and caked-on materials. Finish the cleansing with a reasonably high-pressure water flush.  
2. Trim Tree Branches: By trimming trees and large shrubs, property owners can avoid falling limbs during windy fall and winter months. Limbs that present as dead or in decline by summer’s end are unlikely to bounce back. It’s more likely they will negatively affect the tree or shrub before falling to the ground. Using an extendable tree limb pruner, stand away from the dying branches and saw them off. You’ll enjoy a healthier tree and avoid possible damage from falling limbs.
3. Inspect And Repair Driveway: The small cracks and seemingly modest gaps that result from intense summer expansion and contraction are too often considered a spring issue. This thinking can cause a property owner sustaining increased damage to the driveway. Water can seep into those cracks and freeze. This may come as something of a surprise, but ice has the strength to separate asphalt and concrete. Rather than take on additional DIY work or pay extra for driveway repairs, deal with the issue as the summer heat wanes.
4. Power Wash The Siding: A home’s exterior can be improved by regularly scheduled power washing. Spraying high-pressure water at the siding removes grit and caked-on sediment. One of the late summer and early fall issues to consider are mold and moss buildups. Warm, moist weather promotes their growths in shaded areas of the house’s exterior. It’s worthwhile to inspect these spaces and pay special attention to removing sometimes hazardous mold growths.