Fall— it’s the best season to perform regular maintenance on some of the hardest-working devices in your rental property. By using this season to do important maintenance items, you’re hitting two birds with one stone. You’re doing proper maintenance and you’re also priming your home to run safely and smoothly all winter long. These maintenance items include checking and cleaning filters, batteries, and water heaters. Some of which may need to be replaced, depending on its condition. All of these tasks have to be done regularly to make sure your rental property is safe for your tenants.
Changing your Mar Vista rental property’s air filters is very important, and it should be done on a regular basis. These filters keep your property’s HVAC system clean and running efficiently. This is why changing the air filters in your rental property is an important part of seasonal maintenance. As the winter months draw near, furnaces start to work harder to keep out the cold as families tend to spend more time indoors. This being the case, it’s clearly important that your filters must be kept clean. Now, there are many kinds of HVAC systems and they use different kinds of filters. So, depending on the specific model you have, you may need to change the filters as often as every 30 days, every three months, or even every six months. While you may want to let your tenants do this themselves— and some may be willing— there is a likely chance that they’re not going to change the filters often enough or just outright forget to do it. Not doing the maintenance tasks properly would strain your HVAC system and may result in the life of the unit being shortened and its efficiency greatly reduced.
Fall is also the best time to test and change the batteries in your rental property’s smoke and carbon monoxide detectors. These devices need to be kept working correctly to make sure your tenants won’t be in danger. Think about it; let’s say a fire damages your property and hurts one of your tenants. Then it turns out your smoke detectors weren’t functioning because the batteries were running low and weren’t replaced. What do you think will happen? You’ll probably be sued— that’s pretty much guaranteed to happen. In other words, it really is critical that these devices be maintained and kept running properly.
There are different kinds of smoke and carbon monoxide detectors. Some have lithium batteries that can last up to ten years— which is ideal since that is also the useful life of a smoke or carbon monoxide detector—while others need to have their batteries changed every six to twelve months. Nevertheless, no matter what kind of battery your devices have, you should still make sure that the batteries are being tested on a regular basis, and replaced immediately when needed. Hundreds of people are injured or killed in house fires every year. This is partly caused by the smoke detectors in their homes failing to alert them in time. 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? On top of that, they may even damage your property’s smoke detectors as they fiddle with them. This would lead to increased liability on your part and an additional expense to replace the devices.
Then we’ve got one of the most frequently used devices in a rental home— the water heater. Despite being used so much, it’s often forgotten when it’s time to do property maintenance tasks. It shouldn’t be neglected or forgotten. Cleaning your property’s water heater is important to keep it working efficiently. 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 dodge these problems easily by 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 seem like another thing you’d want your tenant to do. But if you let them clean your water heater, you risk a lot of things. They may not do it correctly and cause even more problems.
Neglecting these maintenance items can have serious consequences and you may have to pay additional costs for expensive repairs later on. But leaving it to your tenant to change or clean the filters, batteries, and water heater in your Mar Vista rental property is not the best option. While it may be the case that you can do all these property maintenance tasks yourself, it would mean you’d have to spend so much of your own time and effort. The smart option would still be to hire a company like Real Property Management California Coast, and they can do all the work 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. Contact us today for more information.
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