What does the outside of your house look like when you walk past it on your way home?
What do others see when they take in where you live, and what is it telling others about how you live?
It can be really easy to overlook the exterior of your property in relation to interior decor. But an unkempt condition can portray a lot about its occupants. Especially the garden.
If you’re lucky enough to have space out the front of your home that others can see on a daily basis, we have some tips that can elevate how it looks and make sure your home looks cared for at all times.
Clear The Driveway Regularly
Driveways accumulate debris faster than you realise, and you can actually become blind to its presence. It’s simply there, and you stop noticing it after a period of time. And the longer it’s left, the more dirt and grime it collects, and the more it makes your home look messy and unkempt.
Make it a habit to go out on a regular basis and give the driveway a quick sweep or use a blower to help you clear the driveway, and remove anything that’s lying around, so you can stop the buildup of moss in the joints or surface staining from settling in. Because once that happens, it’s much harder to rectify.
Keep Edges Sharp
Grass that creeps over the edge of a path or driveway will make everything around look messy, regardless of how tidy that part actually is.
You need to run a weed wacker around the edges and where you’re experiencing weed growth to help you maintain clean, neat lines that separate your lawn from your hard surfaces and create definition where you need it.
Plus, doing this helps to discourage grass from encroaching into beds and borders over time. It’s a small detail and one that’s often overlooked in terms of importance in garden maintenance, but it can make a huge difference when undertaken regularly.
Pressure Wash Before Winter
You need to pressure wash hard surfaces on a regular basis to remove dirt and grime that accumulates on the surface from use and from the environment. Think driveways, patios, paths, and even your exterior walls. All of these can get dirty and detract from the curb appeal of your home.
The best time to do this is late fall, before winter hits and the cold sets in. This can help to prevent the surface from deteriorating faster in the harsher weather winter brings. Plus, it also makes a considerable visual difference too. You might not realise how dirty things have become, but once they’ve been washed, you’ll notice the difference immediately.
Trim Back Overgrowth Early
Shrubs, hedges, and climbing plants that are allowed to grow unchecked and spread will look messy and unruly fast. Before you know it, they’re climbing up walls, covering windows, and heading over to your neighbors’ houses or boundaries, too.
You need to deal with overgrowth before it becomes a problem to help you keep it under control. A light trim two or three times per year makes it much more manageable than dealing with it once it’s already out of control and you’re fighting it to rein it back in again or remove it entirely.
Fix Small Cracks Before They Spread
These are things like cracks in paths, driveways, and render. They might start small, but if you don’t rectify them, they’ll spread fast, causing more damage, they’ll become harder to fix, and be more expensive to repair.
And if you leave them over winter, for example, and water infiltrates the damage, it can end up freezing, thawing, freezing, etc., until too much damage has occurred.
So if you notice anything like this happening, get the crack fixed urgently, especially before winter sets in.
Clean The Gutters
Blocked gutters overflow, and overflowing gutters send water down the face of the building and into the ground surrounding it.
When you don’t fix your gutters or clear buildup from them, the problem will just get worse over time until you’re looking at damage to the building, the foundation, and the structure. Not just cracked gutters and soggy ground.
The best course of action here is to check your gutters at least twice yearly, ideally in the fall and after the worst of the winter weather as spring rolls around. You want to check for leaves and debris that have accumulated, and remove anything that’s not supposed to be there.
Repaint The Front Door
Your front door takes a battering from the weather all year round. From the sun fading the colour and damaging the material to the rain staining the paintwork, leaving it looking grubby from the residue in the water.
From here, you’ll start noticing things like chips, peeling paint and a door that suddenly looks tired and dirty.
Regularly cleaning your door can help you out here but so too can repainting it every few years or as and when it needs a quick refresh.
While you’re here, you can check the door and the frame for damage, but if none is obvious or the door is still in good condition, a coat of fresh paint can work wonders.
Stay On Top of Moss
Your home can accumulate moss faster than you might realise. And one day it can be a small patch, but before you know it it’s running rampant across your outdoor space.
Moss can appear on roofs, driveways, and lawns. And if it isn’t removed or treated then it can become a big problem. On hard surfaces, moss can retain moisture, accelerate surface degradation and become a slip hazard.
On a lawn, it’s an entirely different story, and it competes with the grass and spreads quickly, especially in shaded or damp areas.
The trick is to treat moss early, as soon as you see it, not when it becomes a problem. Use an appropriate product and follow up by improving drainage if required and increasing light to help you avoid having to repeat these actions.
