Autumn Maintenance for Park Homes

The coming of autumn brings new challenges for the maintenance of your park home. Here are a few ideas to help to get your park home in the best shape for the coming months.

Make a maintenance schedule

It is always good idea to organise your jobs and time in advance and to do them in the right order. Discovering a problem as you tackle another can lead to backtracking and having to repeat jobs that you have already done. Here, we have attempted to present the autumn maintenance tasks in a sensible order.

Check your utilities

It is good to start with the basics, energy being possibly the most fundamental. Book in a certified electrician and a gas engineer as this is a good time to carry out your annual checks. Have supply cables, fuel pipes, sockets and connections, your boiler, stove and appliances thoroughly checked as your usage becomes heavier in the colder and shorter days ahead.

Your park home management and neighbours are a good source of information about reliable and trustworthy professionals to carry out this work, if you don’t already have someone you regularly use. Also take a look at our previous blog post on finding the right maintenance contractor for your park home.

A professional should also be able to check that all your safety devices are in good working order. Your smoke and carbon monoxide alarms should be checked and working reliably. Replace batteries or whole units where necessary.

Heating in your park home

You should also think about booking a qualified and certificated plumber with experience of park homes to check your radiators and other pipe-work.

If you have a wood or other fuel burning stove, check that it is well ventilated and the flues are clear of any debris both inside and out.

Lighting

An electrician should check your lighting is safe and working. Ask them to pay special attention to any outside lights you may have. As the nights get longer, you will rely more heavily on them to guide you safely around your outdoor spaces. You can look yourself to replace batteries where needed on LED lights. Check for corrosion and other problems with seals on light coverings that may cause outages as the weather closes in.

Think about having one or more emergency lights fitted if you have not already done so. In case of an outage they run on an independent power source and are invaluable in such circumstances. For the same reason, make sure you have a working torch with spare batteries stored somewhere easy to find.

Ventilation

Ventilation of your park home is particularly important as Autumn approaches. Internally and externally clean and check your air vents. It is good to head into the windy seasons with these free of garden debris and leaves. Garden gloves, a hose and a stiff brush should be all you need to complete this task. As the autumn progresses, maintenance is then a simple matter of removing any new build up.

Remember to secure ladders and preferably have someone else to help if you need to use one.

Guttering

Regular maintenance of your guttering and downpipes is important to ensure that water is flowing where it should be. Depending on your proximity to trees, you may need to remove leaves frequently in the autumn. Also, check that your guttering and pipes aren’t blocked and that all joints are sealed correctly.

If your park home is situated near some large trees, then be aware of any risks that they pose if there are damaged branches. Talk to your park management if you are concerned or contact a specialist tree surgeon or council arboricultural officer for advice.

Doors and windows in your park home

Checking doors and windows should be part of your autumn maintenance schedule as you don’t want handles or fastenings to fail completely. Either call in a professional or fix or replace them yourself if they are loose or damaged. Remember to check the seals too.

Underneath your park home

Use access panels if you have them to have a look at the underside of your park home and make sure it is clear of debris. Check the skirting around your home to make sure there are no inviting holes through which animals looking for shelter can crawl. This way, you will not unwittingly provide autumn and winter quarters for unwanted critters.

Check awnings and other outdoor coverings

Autumn can bring some strong winds so check the weather forecast and make sure that awnings, umbrellas, etc are either secure or put away for the winter. If you have sufficient storage space, you may also want to put away your garden furniture to protect it from the elements.

Completing these maintenance tasks in the autumn should help to remain safe and comfortable during the winter. Also, remember that regular maintenance may be condition of your park home insurance.

This is a marketing article from Park Home Assist, multi award-winning providers of residential park home insurance.  If you would like to speak to an advisor regarding insurance for your park home, please contact our friendly team in our Northampton office on 01604 946 796.

To stay up to date with similar topics like this, please like and follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook.

For more information about any of our other insurance products, please choose your product of interest below:

Published – 22/10/21