Winter Proof Your Home

Jan 2010

TrustMark urges homeowners to prepare their homes for the onslaught of the freezing temperatures or face the misery of burst pipes over Christmas. With the Met Office issuing heavy snow warnings for Eastern and South Eastern England thousands of homeowners will be vulnerable to the implications of freezing weather conditions unless they batten down their hatches and winter proof their home.

Roman Russocki, Chief Executive of TrustMark said: "Up to 20cm (8in) of snow has already fallen in counties including Kent, Essex and Sussex and more is set to come over the next few days creating prime conditions for frozen plumbing in homes. In the run up to Christmas and over the festivities many households will be left empty as the occupants fly off to sunnier climes or back home to their families and with no central heating to keep temperatures up they could return home to expensive plumbing disasters. It is therefore vital that homeowners, particularly the elderly, do their best to minimise the potential damage and ensure that if things do go wrong, they hire legitimate tradesmen to carry out any repair work.

Here are some simple tips on how to winter proof your home:

• Insulate pipes in unheated areas such as the attic, garage or basement. Use insulating tape or molded pipe sleeve and wrap it over the entire length of exposed pipe. Cover all valves, pipe-fittings, etc. with insulating tape or fiberglass. Check your hardware store for supplies
• If you are going away for Christmas shut off and drain your water system by turning off the water heater before draining the system. Leaving your central heating on a very low setting while you're away may also help
• Open cupboard doors in the kitchen and bathrooms. Water lines supplying the kitchen or bathrooms are frequently located in outside walls. Any air leaks in siding or insulation can cause these pipes to freeze. Leaving the cupboard doors open when the temperature is below freezing allows pipes behind the cupboards to get more heat
• Let the water run if the temperature dips below freezing. A stream slightly smaller than a pencil width should be sufficient. Using cold water will save on your gas or electric bill

"However hard we try to protect our homes from bad weather conditions, many of us will still require a tradesman to carry out repair work. To avoid falling prey to a rogue trader it is best to use a Government-backed website such as TrustMark which host thousands of reliable and trustworthy tradesmen and whose work is regularly inspected on-site and who operate to Government Endorsed Standards."