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Your Warm Weather Electrical Projects Checklist

As beautiful springtime weather rolls into the Denver-Boulder area, many homeowners start thinking about household projects they want to scratch off the ‘honey-do’ list while outdoor conditions are ideal for working around the house. Electrical projects often land somewhere near the top of the list, so our helpful, knowledgeable team would like to chip in with our suggestions of electrical work you may want to consider for this spring or summer. Save Home Heat’s highly skilled, experienced electricians would be glad to assist you with honest, low-pressure advice, and top-rated professional service.

COVID-19 Awareness

Sitting here in the spring of 2020, with the COVID-19 situation impacting all of our lives, our team fully understands that work performed at our customers’ homes currently is more comfortably focused on the outdoors – and in many cases, there’s plenty to do! The primary focus of this blog is on that type of electrical work, along with some other ideas to consider. In order to assure the safety of our valued customers and crew, we have enacted a series of precautions so that Save Home Heat Company can continue serving our customers.

Outdoor Electrical Checklist

Here are some ways you can improve safety, security and convenience, and also enhance your quality of life outside your home with a variety of electrical improvements:

Outdoor Lighting: Installation, Replacement, Upgrades & Repairs

Could your outdoor leisure areas use a bit of an upgrade in nighttime navigability? Would you like to highlight a beautiful new shrub, flower bed, or rock garden while you sit out back after sundown? How about a bit more light for the pathways to the back door, the garage, or at your entryways?

Sometimes, a modest investment in upgrading outdoor lighting can create significant changes that you’ll enjoy and appreciate for many years to come. Post lights, flood and spotlights, barn lights, bollard lights, recessed fixtures, wall lanterns and sconces, and step lights are just some of the products that can enhance your outdoor lighting.

If you have local ‘dark sky’ ordinances that affect your choice of lighting product, lumen levels, fixture location and orientation, look to one of our experienced electricians for the right recommendations to match your needs.

Our electrical team can also assist you in upgrading your outdoor lighting with a variety of standard and state-of-the-art controls, offering features such as programmable lighting zones, motion sensor and sundown response, energy-efficient LED lighting, WiFi options, and more.

Electrical Circuits, Wiring Repairs, Safety and Feature Upgrades

Our experienced, professional electricians can assist you with repairs, upgrades, and new installations for a wide variety of outdoor electrical needs or projects. For example, we can help you by replacing damaged electrical outlets and switches, upgrading to GFI outlets for greater safety, or repairing or replacing aging or poorly supported conduit or wiring. We can also install new weather-rated electrical outlets for patios, decks or balconies, as well as new dedicated circuits for detached garages, workshops, studios, hot tubs, and other special purposes.

Please contact me to schedule a free outdoor lighting or electrical install quote!

Electrical panel upgrades

Over time, your home’s electrical panel and the circuit breakers it houses can slowly deteriorate from normal wear and tear. Along the way, National Electrical Code may also have updated to higher safety standards for panels such as yours. This is not to say that your electrical panel is unsafe and should be replaced. We see code revisions on a fairly regular basis, and many of these are intended to increase safety, efficiency or sustainability. The reality, however, is that if your home was built 15 or 20 years ago, there’s a good chance that the main electrical panel in your home would not meet current code.

Another reason for replacing an existing electrical panel that we often come across is that it cannot safely accommodate increased electrical needs of the home (new AC, hot tub, basement finish, addition, remodel…). So if you’re not sure if your existing electrical system will safely handle the new load, now’s a good time to get started on this work.

Electrical Vehicle (EV) charging stations

Do you own a hybrid or an all-electric vehicle, and have decided it’s time to have your own charging station at home? Our team installs high quality EV and BEV home charging stations, and we would be glad to install one that you provide. If you prefer, we can assist further by expertly specking and supplying a charger that matches your specific needs. Common locations for home EV charging stations are inside the garage or in an adjacent carport or a convenient driveway location. Another growing trend is for private businesses to provide charging stations for their employees at their offices and shops, and this is something our team can also assist you with.

Indoor Electrical Projects…

Depending on the current COVID-19 situation, some of these projects may be ones you’ll wish to learn more about now, but possibly place on the back burner for a later date, hopefully in the near future. Regardless, it doesn’t hurt to get started thinking if one of these is on your list:

Basement Finish & Home Remodel Electrical

Our electrical department can assist you with full services for projects in your home such as kitchen and bathroom remodels, basement finishes, sunrooms, and more. If this work can be performed during warm weather, all the better, but we are fully equipped to handle your electrical needs at any time of year.

Attic, Ceiling, & Exhaust Fan Installations and Replacements

Solar-powered attic exhaust fans continue to grow in popularity, and now’s a great time to consider experiencing the benefits for your home. Reduce heat buildup in your attic space, assist passive vents installed in your attic, decrease the load on your AC system, and help create a more comfortable upstairs level. Or, think about having new ceiling fans installed in your living or great room, kitchen, bedrooms or home office. The benefits of propeller-style ceiling fans are several, and they can assist during both the summer and the winter. In many cases, our customers supply the ceiling fan and we install it for them.

Smoke Detector & Carbon Monoxide Alarm Coverage

While not limited to spring and summer, proper smoke detector and carbon monoxide alarm coverage and routine maintenance is always high on our list of home safety conversations with our customers. Make sure your detectors are doing their jobs and are within their effective lifespans (time can fly!). Please speak with one of our electricians about routine and annual maintenance of these important safety devices in your home, and learn about new options that might make your life easier as well as safer.

Annual Electrical Safety Inspection – Indoors and Out

Having an experienced electrical team like ours to perform a comprehensive whole-home assessment of your home’s electrical system each year is a great way to help ensure your safety and keep abreast of new electrical efficiency and convenience innovations. Working with a team like Save Home Heat Company, that takes the time to fully inform our customers and answer all their questions in a friendly, low-pressure fashion, will assure that your best interests and safety are the sole focus of this important annual visit.

Miscellaneous Electrical Repairs

If you’ve already scheduled a service visit from one of our electricians, consider saving on the cost of a separate visit and make a list of minor repairs you’d like to have performed at the same time, or consider grouping some of the above work together for bundled savings. Miscellaneous repairs might include things such as ‘dead’ or cracked outlets and switches, exposed or loose wires, or taking a closer look at flickering lights.

Please contact me to schedule a free installation quote, or to schedule an electrical service call!