home insurance <\/a>policy won\u2019t cover for most pest-related damages to your home, because it\u2019s largely seen as a maintenance and preventable issue, meaning you\u2019ll have to foot the bill.<\/p>\nThe only exceptions would be for sudden or accidental damages, so if pests were responsible for weakening a support beam and it caused part of your home to collapse, then your home insurance would probably cover the incidentals, but the actual support beam that fell due to pests would be yours to replace. Even if you were unable to prevent an infestation, early detection is always preferable before the situation gets even worse.<\/p>\n
One easy thing to do when buying a new home is to get an inspection, if not mandatory, and make sure they also check for infestations or pests. And schedule regular or annual sprayings for the most common pests in your area; many times pest control firms will provide a year\u2019s warranty so that if you develop an issue with pests, they will come back and retreat the problem. Even if you never have pests – best case scenario – you would be ensuring that any potential threats are caught early!<\/p>\n
Many common pest control measures can easily be integrated into your seasonal home maintenance and repair:<\/p>\n
\u2022 Trim back hedges, trees, and shrubs from sitting against the side of the house
\n\u2022 Seal all windows, doors, and cracks to prevent pests from getting in
\n\u2022 Caulk cracks along walls, cupboards, and ceilings
\n\u2022 Keep your floors and home surfaces clean and free of moisture
\n\u2022 If you have a basement or attic, make sure it stays dry and well ventilated
\n\u2022 Clear off your roof once a year, and clean gutters
\n\u2022 Keep ripe fruit in the refrigerator
\n\u2022 Any containers of food should be tightly sealed
\n\u2022 Empty the trash nightly
\n\u2022 Repair any rotted or soft wood quickly
\n\u2022 Keep firewood away from the house (20 feet)<\/p>\n
Some pests aren\u2019t necessarily hazardous to your health or to your property but they can be a nuisance, so you can use some simple DIY tricks:<\/p>\n
Ants<\/strong> – coffee grounds, or a mix of borax and sugar
\nRoaches<\/strong> – sprinkle borax along kitchen and bathroom cabinets
\nRodents<\/strong> – use traps baited with dried peanut butter, cheese, or raw bacon
\nFruit Flies<\/strong> – a jar of apple cider vinegar, cover lid with plastic wrap, poke holes
\nFlies<\/strong> – cloves, eucalyptus and clover blossoms in a sachet<\/p>\nFor a variety of insects, they\u2019re repelled by the smell of lavender, peppermint, and citronella.<\/p>\n
Remember, early detection is key and prevention is best! Be sure to employ some of these no-nonsense pest control measures to prevent having to pay for it down the road, and check to see what your home insurance policy covers or doesn\u2019t cover in regards to pests. Typical policy exclusions often include: bats, rats, mice and other rodents, bees, termites and moths, vermin, birds, fish, reptiles, insects and spiders.<\/p>\n
Do you have any pest control tips? Feel free to share your thoughts and experiences in the comments section below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Prevention is the name of the game! It\u2019s always easier to keep pests from even coming in rather than having to exterminate or get rid of them once they\u2019re an issue. However, there are some easy ways to do both and keep your home pest free! And it just makes sense to keep any major […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10438,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[313],"tags":[97],"importance":[],"type-content":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.freeway.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10435"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.freeway.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.freeway.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.freeway.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.freeway.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10435"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.freeway.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10435\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25848,"href":"https:\/\/www.freeway.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10435\/revisions\/25848"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.freeway.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10438"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.freeway.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10435"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.freeway.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10435"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.freeway.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10435"},{"taxonomy":"importance","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.freeway.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/importance?post=10435"},{"taxonomy":"type-content","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.freeway.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/type-content?post=10435"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}