What does the house need, and when?

The short answer

A house has a short list of things to know and a longer list of things to do each season. You can learn the short list in one afternoon with someone who knows houses. The long list goes on the calendar, a month at a time.

What to do

1. Ask someone who knows houses to walk you through yours for an afternoon, or pay a handyman for an hour.
2. Find and label the water shut-off, the gas shut-off and every breaker.
3. Test the smoke and carbon monoxide alarms, and note each smoke alarm's age: ten years is the limit.
4. Put the seasonal jobs on The year's jobs, a month at a time.
5. Write the emergency numbers on Your numbers, in one place, and put a copy on the fridge.
6. Hire anything that needs a ladder.
7. Show one other person your list, and where you keep it.

What can wait

• Improvements. Anything that isn't broken.
• Learning how each thing works. Knowing where it is, and who to call, is enough for now.
• A search for missing manuals.
• His list of unfinished repairs, unless something on it leaks or feels unsafe to you.

Who can help

A handyman can walk you through the house for an hour, and can come back for the alarms and the jobs on a ladder.

If you smell gas, use no phone inside. Leave, then call 911 from a neighbor's house or somewhere well away.

At 60 or older, your local Area Agency on Aging can say whether you qualify for home repair help; the Eldercare Locator finds it at 1-800-677-1116 or eldercare.acl.gov. Some hardware stores run classes for people learning their house, and you can ask at yours.

The rules, phone numbers and web addresses in this book were checked against the agencies’ own pages in October 2026. They change, so check anything you rely on with the office itself.

Hear when the next book is out

Five or six short emails a year at most, and a note when a new book is out. Each one is about something that tends to come up in the first two years. You can unsubscribe whenever you like.