Winter vacation is around the corner and it’s that time of the year when most of us are busy preparing and revising our travel bucket lists. Living in Pakistan, you will never run out of places to travel during the winter season. The country is home to some of the most breathtaking hill stations that you can visit with your family to enjoy the snowfall season. So, as you pack for the upcoming holiday season, don’t forget to prepare your home for vacation as well, if you want to keep it safe and secure in your absence. Meanwhile, to help you enjoy a worry-free vacation, we have just prepared a checklist of things you need to take care of before leaving the house to make sure everything stays in order while you are away.
Ways to Prepare Your Home for Vacation
Besides packing and checking your luggage, make sure you are following all the below-given steps if you desire to return to a secure, neat and orderly house after the holidays.
- Carry out a House-Wide Cleaning Activity
- Check the Laundry
- Precautions for Fire
- Install Timers for Lights
- Check Door Locks and Windows
- Ask Someone to Check on Your House
This was the checklist for preparing your home for vacation
Carry Out A House-Wide Cleaning Activity
The last thing you’ll want to experience after a nice, relaxing winter vacation is coming back to a dirty home. Walking into a dirty house after long days of unwinding will spoil all your post-holiday mojo. So, the very first thing on your checklist for preparing your home for vacation should be “cleaning”. However, there might not be a need to deep clean everything before leaving but at least you should vacuum your home to clear off any accumulated dust and cover up all your furniture to make sure things don’t get dirty again while you are away.
Check your pantry and refrigerator and remove any food items that can get stale in order to keep fruit flies and bacteria from taking over when the house is empty. Also, eat away all the unrefrigerated fruits and vegetables. Carrying out a cleaning task in toiletries will also effectively help you in keeping your home sanitised and germ-free
Check the Laundry
When you are haphazardly running around cleaning and packing the house, chances of forgetting some of the most obvious things increase. For instance, that final load of laundry in the washer you forgot to transfer to the dryer. You don’t want to come home to a full load of wet laundry, which has had to sit and sour for days. So, before you leave, don’t forget to take a final look at the washer.
Precautions for Fire
House fires are extremely unpredictable and can decimate a property within minutes. Some of the most common causes of accidental fires include unattended kitchen and heating equipment, faults in electrical wiring and plugged appliances with electrical overload. So, to avoid such situations, you need to make sure that all of the cooking heating and electrical appliances in your living are not connected with power to eliminate the risk of house fire during your absence. Precaution against fire is one of the most important things to do to keep your house safe while you are away.
Install Timers for Lights
If you turn off all the lights in your home before leaving, it will make your home appear completely dark at night, making it an easy target for burglars. However, in this case, the best thing you can do is to install timers with lights in your home to deter break-ins. You can even install the smart lighting systems in your home, which are easily available these days. These lights can be controlled remotely through an application installed on your smartphone, allowing you to better stimulate as if someone’s home. So, when working on the checklist for preparing your home for vacation, don’t forget about the installation of the smart lighting system.
Check Doors and Locks
So, are you ready to leave? Did you check all the windows, doors and locks? Well, to ensure your home security, it’s wise to check and lock every possible entry point and seal all other types of inlets around your living space. Is that rarely-used backdoor locked too? If not, then do it right away as such type of entry point is probably the very first place an intruder would check. Make sure there aren’t any doors or windows cracked open. Also, don’t forget to turn on your home security system and alert the security company about your absence, which is one of the most important things to do to keep your house safe while you are away.
Ask Someone to Check on Your House
No matter how many precautions you take before going on a vacation, it’s always a good idea to ask a neighbour or a friend to keep a check on your house while you are away. That way, they will be able to timely inform you and the authorities like the police or the fire department in case of any noticeable suspicious activity or an emergency situation.
These were some of the most effective ways to prepare your home for vacation. If you want to add something to this list based on your personal experience that can make this blog more helpful for our readers, please share it with us at blog@zameen.com.
On a side note, you can also take a look at our blogs in which we have discussed some budget-friendly ways to secure your home and talked about smart gadgets for your home.
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