First-year homeowner - what should I actually be doing?

Monthly

• Check and flush the AC condensate drain line. A clogged line is the number one cause of ceiling damage in this state.
• Change or check the filter.

Quarterly

• Run water in unused drains so the traps do not dry out.
• Look under every sink and around the water heater for damp.
• Test the GFCI outlets.

Twice a year

• Clear the gutters before the wet season starts.
• Walk the roof line with binoculars, looking at pipe boots and flashing rather than the shingles.
• Trim branches back off the roof.
• Clean the dryer vent.

Annually, and the one thing to do today

1. 1Have the HVAC serviced.
2. 2Re-caulk the tub and shower where the joint has opened.
3. 3Check the attic for daylight and for wet insulation after a hard rain.
4. 4Find the main water shutoff, label it, and make sure it turns.

Around nine in ten of the expensive calls I get started as one item on this list. If the house is new, the other date that matters is the eleven-month warranty list.

Set it up once, then it runs

1. 1Put the monthly and quarterly items in a calendar with reminders.
2. 2Keep one folder: permits, warranties, the insurance declaration page, the wind mitigation report and any inspection reports.
3. 3Photograph the model and serial plates on the air handler, condenser and water heater.
4. 4Write down the shutoff locations for water, power and gas, and tell everyone in the house.

That folder is also the thing that makes the house easy to sell later, because every document a buyer or an insurer asks for is already in it.

Before the first storm season

Walk the outside of the house once and look at four things: where water leaves the roof, whether the ground slopes away from the walls, whether trees overhang the roof, and whether anything loose in the garden would move in wind.

Then check that you know how to shut off the water and the power, and that your insurance documents and permits are somewhere you could find them quickly. That is most of storm preparation, and it is done once rather than annually.

The two things worth paying for

An annual air-conditioning service, because the system runs most of the year here and a failed capacitor in August is an emergency call at emergency prices. And a gutter clean before the wet season if the house has trees near it.

Everything else on this list is yours to do with a torch and half an hour. That is the point of it: almost none of the expensive failures in a Florida house start as something complicated.