The holidays change how a house is used. More people under one roof. Systems running longer. Lights and cords that only come out once a year. None of this means something is wrong. It simply means the home is being used more than usual. This is not the week to start projects or chase fixes. It is a good time to notice how your home behaves when it is full, busy, and lived in. These DIY home checks are about awareness, not action.
Listen before you look
When a home is quiet, small issues stay hidden. When it is full, they tend to stand out. You might hear airflow that sounds uneven, notice a door that sticks, or realize one room never warms up like the others. Do not diagnose. Do not adjust settings. Just pay attention. Patterns matter more than one moment.
Walk common areas once
Take a slow walk through the spaces everyone uses. Entryways, steps, handrails, and exterior lighting matter more when guests are coming and going. You are not inspecting. You are simply asking whether anything feels less solid or less safe than it should.
Watch where water shows itself
More showers, more dishes, and more sinks in use put extra demand on plumbing. In many homes, small leaks show up in predictable places. Look under sinks. Check around exterior doors. Notice any damp spots, staining, or musty smells. You do not need to move storage or access crawl spaces this week. Surface clues are enough.
Be realistic about cords and outlets
Holiday lighting, phone chargers, and temporary setups are common this time of year. This is also when overloaded outlets and worn extension cords cause problems. Basic electrical safety guidance from the National Fire Protection Association focuses on avoiding overloaded outlets, keeping cords in good condition, and keeping them out of walkways. These are not extreme precautions. They are simple habits that reduce preventable risks while the house is busy.
Notice comfort, not settings
Instead of adjusting the thermostat, notice how evenly the home feels. Rooms that stay cold, vents that barely move air, or areas that feel drafty often become obvious when people are home more often. You do not need to act on this now. Comfort patterns are useful information to have later.
Noticing is enough
These DIY home checks are not tasks to complete. They are observations to carry forward. If nothing stands out, that is a good sign. If something does, it can wait until life slows down again. If you want a clearer picture later, a professional home inspection can help you understand what you noticed and what actually matters. For now, let the house do its job. Hold people, conversations, meals, and time together.
When looking for a home inspector, it’s good to know what to look for. Every home inspector claims to be the best and offers the best service. But actually finding the right inspector is and can be the most challenging part of the home buying process. When choosing an inspector, the first thing you want to do is evaluate what the home inspectors offer, the price point they charge, and the reviews that they have.
When looking at the services a home inspector offers you want to make sure that they offer more than just a generic run-of-the-mill inspection. Instead, you want to make sure they offer a wide variety such as sewer/septic tank inspections, pest, mold, water, foundation, and radon testing inspections are some inspections you might want. It’s important that the inspector you have is qualified, and certified, and offers the ability to inspect what you need.
The next thing is to look at the price point. You want to make sure you are paying a market competitive price for the square footage you need to be inspected. This could be as simple as getting a quote from other inspectors, or just using an inspector that is highly reviewed and trusted in your area. Either way, anywhere from $400-$1,200 is what could be expected for a reasonable 1,500-square-foot home inspection.
The last and most credible part of choosing an inspector is looking at the reviews. You want a company that has a high number of reviews and a high star rating. Anything over 4 stars is ideal and if they have more than 200 reviews, then you’re off to a good start. You can find the highest-rated home inspectors HERE if you need a reference of one we love and trust. One last note is to not use the home inspector your realtor recommends. Oftentimes, realtors will pay or use inspectors that will help the house sell, rather than find all of the details wrong with the house.
Radon mitigation is any process used to reduce radon gas concentrations in the breathing zones of occupied buildings, or radon from water supplies. Radon is a significant contributor to environmental radioactivity. Mitigation of radon in the air is accomplished through ventilation, either collected below a concrete floor slab or a membrane on the ground or by increasing the air changes per hour in the building. Treatment systems using aeration or activated charcoal are available to remove radon from domestic water supplies. Because high levels of radon have been found in every state of the United States, testing for radon and installing radon mitigation systems has become a specialized industry since the 1980s. Many states have implemented programs that affect home buying and awareness in the real estate community, however, radon testing and mitigation systems are not generally mandatory unless specified by a local jurisdiction.
According to the EPA’s “A Citizen’s Guide to Radon, the method to reduce radon “primarily used is a vent pipe system and fan, which pulls radon from beneath the house and vents it to the outside”, which is also called sub-slab depressurization, soil suction, or active soil depressurization. Generally, indoor radon can be mitigated by sub-slab depressurization and exhausting such radon-laden air to the outdoors, away from windows and other building openings. EPA generally recommends methods that prevent the entry of radon. Soil suction, for example, prevents radon from entering your home by drawing the radon from entering your home and venting it through a pipe, or pipes, to the air above the home where it is quickly diluted and EPA does not recommend the use of sealing alone to reduce radon because, by itself, sealing has not been shown to lower radon levels significantly or consistently according to the EPA’s “Consumer’s Guide to Radon Reduction: How to fix your home.
Ventilation systems can utilize a heat exchanger or energy recovery ventilator to recover part of the energy otherwise lost in the process of exchanging air with the outside. For crawl spaces, the EPA states, An effective method to reduce radon levels in crawlspace homes involves covering the earth floor with a high-density plastic sheet. A vent pipe and fan are used to draw the radon from under the sheet and vent it to the outdoors. This form of soil suction is called sub-membrane suction, and when properly applied is the most effective way to reduce radon levels in crawlspace homes.”
The most common approach is the active soil depressurization(ASD). Experience has shown that ASD is applicable to most buildings since radon usually enters from the soil and rock underneath and mechanical ventilation (MV) is used when the indoor radon is emitted from the building materials. A less common approach works efficiently by reducing air pressures within cavities of exterior and demising walls where radon emitting from building materials, most often concrete blocks collect.
In hot, humid climates heat recovery ventilators (HRV), as well as energy recovery ventilators (ERV), have a record of increasing indoor relative humidity and dehumidification demands on air conditioning systems. Mold problems have originated in homes that have been radon mitigated with HRV and ERVs have an excellent record in heating climates.
A recent technology is based on building science. It includes a variable rate mechanical ventilation system that prevents indoor relative humidity from rising above the present level such as 50% which is currently suggested by the US Environmental Protection Agency and others as an upper limit for the prevention of mold. It has proven to be especially effective in hot, humid climates. It controls the air delivery rate so that the air conditioner is never overloaded with more moisture than it can effectively remove from the indoor air.
It is generally assumed that air conditioner operation will remove excess moisture from the air in the breathing zone, but it is important to note that just because the air conditioner cools does not mean that it is also dehumidifying. If it is 14 degrees or less, it may not dehumidify at all even though it is cooling.
Factors that are likely to aggravate indoor humidity problems from mechanical ventilation-based radon installations are as follows and an expert radon mitigation/building scientist will check for and correct any and all of the following when he or she performs radon mitigation procedures:
Air conditioner duct leaks located outside the breathing zone, such as in the attic.
Excessive exhaust fan operation
Oversized or over-capacity air conditioners
AC air handler fans do not stop running when the air conditioner compressor stops running.
Delta, which is the amount that the air-cooled as it is passed through the air conditioner’s cooling coils. A good delta performance figure for home air conditioners is about 20F in comparison, automobile air conditioners deliver delta performance of 32 to 38f. A delta of 14f will dehumidify poorly if at all.
