Comments on: Preparing Our House for a Long Trip Away

By: Jean

Jean — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 20:11:02 +0000

My husband is retiring in a few weeks and we plan on spending the winter in Arizona. Here in B.C. we do get below freezing temps so I was concerned about our water pipes.
I am so glad I found your web page, and I want to thank you for posting the helpful hints. Those were all very helpful hints.Now I know what I have to do. Shutting off the water and setting the gas water heater to vacation will be one of the last things I do before leaving.
Someone mentioned turning an ice cube tray upside down, to determine if the hydro had been off for any length of time. this is also a great hint.

By: Mark

Mark — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 16:21:11 +0000

Is it cool to turn off the gas coming in to the house at the meter? We’re going to go out of town for a couple weeks. We just discovered a tiny gas leak in the line to the fireplace, but I don’t have time to get a plumber out here to fix it. Turning off the gas should just stop everything, so we can worry about it when we get back home, right? Is there any kind of problem if you don’t tell the gas co. you’re doing that?

By: SingleGuyMoney

SingleGuyMoney — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 05:12:37 +0000

Not sure if you subscribe to a newspaper or not but make sure they temporarily stop your subscription so you don’t have a yard full of newspapers saying “Hey, no one is home here”.

By: Larry

Larry — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 22:45:47 +0000

Last year we went to Cancun for a week and before we left we went out and bought one of those 24 hour electronic timers. We used it to power two lamps near windows for a few hours at night while we were gone. This way. It appeared someone was always home.

Also, leave your fans on low. Otherwise, when you get home, you will have a very stale smell in your house that will not go away for days. Besides, it only cost a few pennies a day to run your ceiling fan.

http://www.TheLuckyMoneyCat.com

By: Gypsie

Gypsie — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 22:35:36 +0000

Make copies of your passports and leave them with someone you trust (and a safe spot while you are traveling). If anything happens to your passports, copies will help expedite the process at the nearest embassy. In addition to notifying my Credit Card companies that I am traveling (and where to expect my card to be), I get their numbers that you can call from overseas (some banks will allow you to call collect, but you need to find that out) in case of emergency and have account numbers written down. Also, make sure someone at home has your itinerary- just in case. And take the address and phone numbers of the embassies as well.

By: Thankful

Thankful — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 17:30:06 +0000

Jon’s note about alerting your credit cards is something I always do (don’t forget to tell your bank also in case you want to use a debit card for any reason). And I will definitely agree with Susan about having food in the house. We’ve avoided many a meltdown after lengthy trips by having food at the house for when we return home. I’d also suggest having trail mix, granola bars, or other snacks that will keep if the power goes out to your fridge and freezer.

I’d make sure to backup your computer, etc., before you leave. Whenever I’m traveling overseas, I make sure to scan in my itinerary, my passport, DL, hotel information abroad, and the toll-free numbers for all my cards (labeled with the last 4 digits of each card). I make this into one PDF and upload it to my web site (not published, just stored in the files) in case I need to access it while traveling. Depending on the trip, I also email this PDF to someone else that I can reach if I can’t get internet access.

By: susan

susan — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 13:18:03 +0000

Two things I do when I go away:

1) turn a full, frozen ice cube tray upside down in a freezer bag. This way, if your home loses power for any reason, you’ll know if the power was out long enough for the food in your freezer to thaw (if you come home to a frozen mess of water instead of cubes in their tray).

2) speaking of food – when you come home, you’ll want to unpack and relax and not deal with dinner arrangements. Have something in the freezer that you can look forward to having for dinner on your 1st (and maybe leftovers the 2nd) night you’re back. I usually make a tray of lasanga or something like that and put it in the freezer. Take that out when you get home and you won’t be tempted to just order take-out that first day home.

Have a wonderful trip! Please post tons of photos for those us who probably will never have the opportunity to see the Holy Land.

By: Jonathan

Jonathan — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 08:53:00 +0000

We’re doing the same thing soon. I am making sure I have all my important data with me. You can also set up remote access to your computer, but our internet is not that reliable so I gave up on that. I guess I’ll just shut the power like you.

Tell your neighbors you’ll be gone and to watch out for abnormal stuff.

Call your credit card company and tell them you’ll be traveling and not to disable your card.

Have fun!