Heat, hail and the odd hard freeze: a season-by-season upkeep plan for North Texas

A year of upkeep, summarized

A North Texas house needs maintenance planned around four pressures: spring storms and hail, long summer heat, a short fall window that is ideal for exterior repairs, and winter cold snaps that can arrive hard and fast. In spring, walk the outside after storms and photograph damage. In summer, watch caulk, weatherstripping, doors and gates as heat and humidity work on them. In fall, fix exterior wood, trim and metal before the cold. In winter, seal out drafts and turn to indoor projects.

My husband Daniel and I run The DFW Handyman, and much of our work is the kind of upkeep that keeps small problems from turning into large ones. We built our Annual Home Maintenance Plan around exactly that idea. This guide gives you the calendar we would follow on our own house, so you can do it yourself or decide which parts to hand off.

Why national checklists miss the point here

Most maintenance lists are written for a generic climate: clean the gutters in fall, check for ice dams in winter, open the windows in spring. Our year looks different. We get sudden spring storms with hail, summers that bake exterior paint and caulk, humidity that swells wood doors, and winters that are mostly mild until a hard freeze arrives. Many people still remember the February 2021 winter storm, and the lesson that a mild climate is not the same as a climate without hard freezes.

Underneath all of it is the soil. Many Texas soils swell when wet and shrink when dry, and that seasonal movement shows up in houses as doors that stick in one season and swing freely in another, cracks that open and close at trim joints, and fence posts that lean. A useful maintenance plan here has to account for both the weather and the ground.

Spring: storm season and the walk after every storm

Spring is when the worst weather usually arrives, so the most important habit is a walk around the house after every serious storm. Look at the roof from the ground, the gutters, window screens, siding, fences and gates, and anything metal that may have been dented. Hail damage is easy to miss on a roof and hard to miss on a soft aluminum surface, so dented downspouts or vents are a clue to look further.

The Texas Department of Insurance advises taking pictures and video of storm damage, covering broken windows and holes to prevent more damage, and keeping receipts, since a policy may pay for temporary repairs. It also warns that it is illegal under state law to waive a homeowners deductible, so be wary of anyone who offers. For the roof itself and the claim process, a roofer's guide to what to do after hail explains the steps.

• Walk the exterior after each major storm and photograph anything damaged
• Check fences and gates for leaning posts, broken pickets and sagging hinges
• Look at window screens, exterior light covers and metal awnings for dents
• Check that gutters and downspouts are attached and draining away from the house
• Note any new cracks in brick, drywall or at door frames, and compare them in summer

Summer: heat, sun and wood that will not sit still

Summer heat does slow, steady damage. Sun breaks down exterior caulk and paint, especially on south- and west-facing walls. Humidity swells wood doors and gates, so the one that worked fine in March starts dragging in July. Weatherstripping flattens and cracks, letting cool air out and hot air in.

Ready.gov's extreme heat guidance recommends weather-stripping doors and windows, covering windows with drapes or shades and adding insulation to keep heat out. Those are also good maintenance habits. Check exterior caulk lines around windows, doors and trim, and replace any that have split or pulled away. If doors start sticking, our guide to why doors stick or will not latch explains what to check before you plane anything.

• Inspect and replace failed exterior caulk around windows, doors and trim
• Replace worn weatherstripping on exterior doors
• Adjust doors and gates that have started to drag
• Aim sprinklers away from fence bases, wood trim and gate posts
• Look for soft or peeling paint on the sunniest walls

Fall: the best weeks for exterior repairs

Fall is the season we recommend for most outdoor carpentry and repair work. Temperatures are milder, which makes paint and caulk easier to apply properly, and fixing things now means the house goes into winter sealed. This is the time to repair the soft trim you noticed in summer, replace rotted fence pickets, reset a leaning gate post and touch up exterior paint where wood is exposed.

Metalwork deserves attention now too. Check railings, gates and carports for rust, especially at welds and where posts meet concrete, and touch up any chips before winter moisture gets into them. If a gate or railing needs refinishing rather than a touch-up, our guide to choosing between powder coating, galvanizing and paint will help you decide.

• Repair soft or rotted trim and sills before winter moisture
• Replace broken fence pickets and reset leaning gate posts
• Touch up exterior paint wherever bare wood shows
• Check railings, gates and carports for rust and chips
• Re-caulk anything that failed over the summer

Winter: sealing out the cold and working indoors

Most of our winter is mild, which is exactly why hard freezes catch houses off guard. Ready.gov's winter weather guidance advises preparing your home to keep out the cold with insulation, caulking and weather stripping, learning how to keep pipes from freezing, and installing and testing smoke alarms and carbon monoxide detectors with battery backups. Gaps around doors and windows, attic access hatches and exterior wall penetrations are worth sealing before the first cold front. Weatherstripping that was flattened by summer heat is often the first thing a cold north wind finds.

For anything involving pipes themselves, talk to a licensed plumber; plumbing work requires a license in Texas, and we refer it out. Winter is also the natural time for indoor projects: built-ins, shelving, crown molding, baseboards, interior door replacement and the drywall and tile repairs that have been waiting. Scheduling them in the quieter months means they are done before spring storms bring the outdoor list back.

Every season: a ten-minute walk-around

Beyond the seasonal tasks, a short walk around the house four times a year catches most problems early. Take your phone, photograph what you see and compare it with the last walk. Changes matter more than conditions: a crack that has grown, a gap that has opened, a door that has started to stick. Keep the photos in one album so the comparison takes seconds.

• Doors and windows: do they open, close and latch easily?
• Trim and siding: any soft spots, peeling paint or open joints?
• Handrails: grab and lean; they should not move at all
• Fences and gates: plumb posts, working latches, no rot at the ground
• Caulk and weatherstripping: intact, flexible and sealed
• Metalwork: rust at welds, hinges and post bases

Keep a simple record, and next year gets easier

The most underrated maintenance tool is a folder, paper or digital, with a page for the house. Note what was repaired, when, by whom and what it cost, and keep the photos from each seasonal walk-around. Over two or three years, patterns appear: the same door sticks every August, the same corner of the fence leans after every wet spring, the same caulk line fails on the west wall.

Those records pay off in other ways too. Receipts and photos help with insurance after a storm, and the Texas Department of Insurance specifically advises keeping receipts for temporary repairs. Warranty paperwork tells you when a repair is still covered; our work carries a one-year warranty, so a note of the date makes it easy to call us back if something we did fails. And when you sell, a clear maintenance history answers many of a buyer's questions before they are asked.

What we handle, and who handles the rest

Our work covers the carpentry, doors, trim, siding repair, drywall, tile, fences and gates, handrails, shelving and welding that make up most of a maintenance calendar. We do not do plumbing, electrical or HVAC work, which require licenses, and we do not repair appliances. For roofs, gutters, foundations and licensed systems, the right move is a specialist in that trade, and we will tell you when something we see points to one.

Every job we do carries a one-year warranty, our pricing is flat-rate with no fees or surcharges, and we are fully insured and bonded. We serve Plano, Frisco and the surrounding suburbs, and the Dallas neighborhoods from Far North Dallas to the Park Cities.

Putting the whole house on a schedule

If keeping a calendar like this sounds like one more thing to manage, that is exactly why we created the Annual Home Maintenance Plan. It puts the house on a schedule so small problems get caught early rather than discovered when something breaks. It suits busy professionals, older homeowners and anyone who wants one trusted team looking after the property, and we shape it around your house and what it needs.

To get started, call, text or send the contact form. Tell us about the house, its age and anything already on your list. If that list has grown long, our guide to sorting a home repair list by urgency is a good first step. We schedule visits rather than squeezing them in, and we keep you informed every step of the way.

Questions people ask me