Winter is coming? Are You Prepared?

We are writing to all tenants/landlords to remind you that winter is coming! Extra precautions need to be taken to protect your home. We want to avoid any costly damage for instance, in a recent case where adequate precautions were not taken; there was a resultant damage in excess of £20,000 in a property where pipes had frozen and then burst causing extensive flooding.

Over winter and especially Christmas, tenants will wish to go away and visit friends and family, we ask that you take the following precautions if you’re away for more than 24 hours: 1) Keep the central heating on a low or normal setting to maintain a temperature of between 12 to 15 degrees Celsius. 2) Turn off the water supply, and shut down and drain any central heating boiler and associated pipe work. To do this, you will need to turn off the water supply at the main stopcock and open all taps, hot and cold, to drain water from roof storage tank and pipes. Circulating water central heating systems will also need to be drained (and refilled on return before re-starting). 3) Ventilate the property to ensure that moisture does not build up inside the home Whilst this is general advice, the characteristics of each individual property may be slightly different. If you are unsure how to take appropriate measures to protect the property whilst you are away please do not hesitate to contact us. Landlords, if you are not at present on a Fully Managed Service it maybe a time to consider upgrading to this contract. Call 0121 321 6090 to discuss.

We also recommend you review your insurance suppliers to make sure that you are covered for your Landlord and Tenant Liability. We need tenants insurance on file, please email a copy to suttoncoldfield@martinco.com