Of all the seasonal work on a house in Western Montana, the fall round is the one that pays for itself most reliably. Spring maintenance finds damage. Fall maintenance prevents it. The difference matters, because the failures that happen between November and March are the expensive kind.
Hose bibs, before anything else
If you do one thing off this entire page, drain the exterior hose bibs.
A hose bib left charged through a hard freeze can split the line behind it, inside the wall. The failure often does not show while it is frozen. It shows on the thaw, when the line pressurises again and starts putting water into a wall cavity that nobody is looking at.
That is a plumbing bill and a drywall bill arriving together, plus whatever the water found on the way down. Disconnecting the hose, shutting off the supply and opening the bib to drain it takes a few minutes per tap.
Frost-free sillcocks are not an exemption. They still need the hose disconnected, because a connected hose stops the valve draining the way it was designed to.
Caulking and the gaps that cost you
Caulk is cheap, quick, and almost entirely ignored until it fails. Its job is keeping water out of the places where two materials meet, and those joints move all winter as temperatures swing.
Work round the windows and doors, then the penetrations: hose bibs, dryer vents, light fixtures, anywhere a cable or pipe passes through a wall. Look for lines that have pulled away, cracked, or gone chalky and hard.
The same pass is a good time to deal with weatherstripping. A door that was merely draughty in October becomes a door with ice on the inside of the frame in January.
Before the first hard freeze
- Disconnect hoses, shut off and drain every exterior bib
- Drain and shut down irrigation if you have it
- Clear gutters once the leaves and needles are actually down
- Check downspouts discharge well clear of the foundation
- Re-caulk failed joints at windows, doors and penetrations
- Replace weatherstripping on doors that leak air
- Replace furnace filters loaded up over smoke season
- Test smoke and CO detectors and replace batteries
- Check the attic for gaps letting warm air into the roof space
- Clear the dryer vent
Filters, after smoke season
Smoke season does something to furnace filters that a normal summer does not. A filter that would ordinarily have months left in it can arrive at fall already loaded, and a loaded filter makes the furnace work harder for less heat at exactly the point you start relying on it.
Change it going into the heating season regardless of how long it has been in. It is one of the cheapest parts of the whole list and one of the few with an immediate, noticeable effect.
While you are at it, test the detectors. Heating season is when CO detectors earn their keep, and a dead battery is not something you want to discover by its absence.
Gutters, but at the right moment
Clearing gutters too early in fall means doing it twice. Wait until the leaves and needles are genuinely down, then clear them before the first hard freeze locks everything in place.
A gutter that freezes full does not drain during a thaw. Water backs up under the shingle edge instead, which is where ice damming starts, and ice damming is a roof and interior problem rather than a gutter one.
When to call a specialist
Draining a hose bib, running a bead of caulk and changing a filter are straightforward. A supply line that has already split, a furnace that will not fire, and gas appliance work are not. We are not a licensed plumber or HVAC contractor. If a line has let go or the heating system needs servicing rather than a filter, that goes to a licensed trade and we will point you to one.
The autumn round is what our seasonal home maintenance service covers, and our maintenance plans fold it into a standing schedule so nobody has to remember it. We do this across Florence, Stevensville and Frenchtown, and the rest of the towns around Missoula.
Want the fall round handled?
We do this list as a single visit every autumn, and plan members get it scheduled without having to ask.