Is your vacation home ready for the season? After sitting empty through the chilly winter months, your beach house might need a little TLC to get it ready for your big summer plans. Thankfully, you don’t have to spend a lot of money to get great results. If you enjoy a little DIY, these three home improvements projects will get your beach house summer-ready on the cheap.
1. Tend the Gutters
If you haven’t cleaned your vacation home’s gutters since the end of hurricane season, this job is overdue. Storms and strong winds fill gutters with debris. If they become blocked and it rains, you could be looking at expensive flooding damage. That’s why a gutter cleaning should be the first project on your list. Cleaning gutters is simple, but it’s a messy job that requires long periods of standing on a ladder. If that’s beyond your comfort level or your beach house is multistory, you may want to hire a pro for this job instead. Thankfully it’s an inexpensive hire, with most homeowners in the area paying between $91 and $170 for a gutter and downspout cleaning.
2. Refresh Tired Linens
Linens and upholstery grow faded and threadbare with time, especially in a rental property that hosts a lot of guests. Go through your vacation home and take stock of curtains, bed sheets, blankets, bath towels, and throw pillow covers. A good wash can breathe new life into linens that are slightly soiled but otherwise in good shape, but you should replace anything that’s stained or worn thin. This is a great opportunity to switch up your color scheme!
3. Liven Up the Landscaping
Depending on how close your vacation property is to the beach, there may be no lawn to speak of. But that doesn’t mean landscaping doesn’t matter. The right accents make your beach house stand apart from the rest and could make the difference between a fully booked season and one that leaves you wondering what went wrong. In-ground plantings control erosion and add life to a beachfront yard, but you’ll need to find hardy plants that can withstand the sand, salt, and wind of an oceanside location, such as these suggestions from Coastal Living. If you don’t want to worry about unearthing plants from the sand each year, a friendly picket fence, colorful planters, and charming patio furniture can make a world of difference.
In addition to these projects, there are a few other maintenance tasks to attend to before opening your vacation home for the season. Have the HVAC system inspected to prevent a midsummer breakdown, schedule roof repairs to take care of any missing or broken shingles, and clean exterior surfaces like windows, siding, and shutters to minimize salt damage. However, these projects are labor-intensive, and many homeowners lack the knowledge to DIY. Find local professionals to handle these big jobs as part of your vacation home’s annual maintenance schedule.
Finally, don’t forget to check smoke detectors, carbon monoxide detectors, and fire extinguishers before opening up for the season. According to Real Simple, it’s time to replace a fire extinguisher when it reaches its printed expiration date or the pressure gauge needle is no longer within the green zone.
Whether you’re renting your vacation home or reserving it for personal use, you want it to look great and function smoothly. A well-maintained vacation home is more inviting to beachgoers looking for a home base, and it makes your own vacations that much more pleasant. As you get ready for the summer season, make sure maintenance, safety checks, and decorative updates all make your to-do list.
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