So you’ve moved into your dream home, feeling a great sense of relief after months of hunting for the perfect sofa and bedding to handpicking the ideal wall paper and kitchen cabinets. With boxes unpacked and everything neatly arranged or stored away, you can look forward to living “happily ever after”? Well, that’s true if you have your home maintenance checklist at hand. Otherwise, you run the risk of having your house fall apart due to the lack of care. Here some tips on how to prevent your house from falling apart:

1. PAINT JOB
   If you own a landed property, you may come across peeling of exterior paint. This could be a result of moisture getting underneath the pain due to rain or from a leaking gutter. You may want to address the problem immediately by scraping off the loose paint, prime it with a sealant and repaint it with a weatherproof paint. Left delayed, the siding might rot. The cost of patching and repainting thereafter could be hefty.
2. YARD CARE
   It’s nice to live in a landed-property. It’s even nicer if you have little garden to call your own. But if left unattended, your yard will be overgrown with weeds and end up looking like a mess. Pests like rats and mosquitoes will end up building their homes in your garden. Take pride in your garden by showing off a well-manicured lawn with an exhibit of colourful blooms. It’s useful to keep pesticides at home for the occasional roach, ants, mozzies and other bugs but always keep them out of reach of children. You may also want to make sure that your children and pets stay away from the areas that you’ve applied the pesticide to. If you find any signs of mud-tubes in the ground around your house or discover holes in wood, you know you have termite problems. Sometimes these terminators are secretly eating up your house even without showing the signs mentioned. But you can listen out for a tell-tale sign by tapping on the wall and pressing your ear against it. If you hear a rustling sound, chances are you may need to call a professional exterminator to check for termites.
3. FIX THAT LEAK
   Dripping faucets, worn toilet flappers and leaky valves are common especially in older buildings or homes. They can be easily fixed using only a few handy tools and hardware. If left unattended over time, however, can cause serious damages to your flooring or walls.
4. MOLDY SMELL
   That musty odour you smell at home is a sure sign of the presence of mold or mildew. Mold grows on a host surface such as kitchen cabinets and bathroom doors, and they love warm, humid environment. Areas or spaces with high level of moisture such as our bathrooms and wash area are favourite haunts of mold and mildew. It can cause serious health problems if the spores get out of hand and start getting into our respiratory system.To get rid of them, mix some bleach with hot water and carefully clean infected areas. Remember to wear rubber gloves and surgical throughout the cleaning process. Allow the mixture to sit in before rinsing the surface with hot water.