Cardinal Home Inspections

Lawn Mowing Tips for Nice Lawns & Personal Safety Done wrong, lawn mowing can damage your lawn, making it more susceptible to diseases. And lawn mowing also poses quite a few safety risks that you definitely want to avoid. This article and video gives lawn mowing tips that will help you to: 1) protect the health of your lawn; and 2) protect the personal safety of you and your children. Lawn Health For the health of your lawn, when you mow you will only want to cut down about one-third of the total height of your grass at any one time. The reason is that if you cut more off than this, it puts too much strain on the grass, since it is the green part of the grass plant that provides the energy for it to grow. You should also sharpen your mower blades after every 10 hours of mowing. Mowing dulls the blade, and when the blade is dull, rather than cut the grass, it instead tears it. And tearing the grass damages it, and makes it more susceptible to ...

Why Would I Ever Want to go Up In My Attic??? If you are like most people, going up in your attic is probably as far down on your list of things to do as you can probably put it. But for saving energy and protecting your home, it is important that you do the proper maintenance for your attic either yourself, or bring in a professional do it for you. And now is a good time to go up there, before your attic gets too hot. This article discusses the following for your attic: * Annual Maintenance Tasks * Operating Tips * Improvement Projects ANNUAL MAINTENANCE TASKS Doing the necessary routine maintenance tasks for your attic is important for: 1) maintaining the energy efficiency of your home; 2) protecting your home from pests and water damage; and 3) extending the life of your roof. The following are the maintenance tasks that you should do at least once a year for your attic: Vents and fans:  You should inspect your attic vents and clean ...

They are lurking in your home, and they attack while you are sleeping, when you leave . . . well basically, they attack all the time. It's the devices which continue to suck power, even when you have their switches turned off. But are these really a big deal when it comes to energy savings? Or are "energy vampires" just an urban myth? Turning off your computer when it is not in use is a great way to save energy. But did you know that even when the computer is switched off, it can still continue to suck electricity from your electrical outlet? This phenomenon of energy still being consumed when appliances or gadgets are turned off is called "vampire power," or sometimes "standby power" or "energy leaks." Does My Home Have Electricity Vampires? There are two simple ways to see whether your appliance is drawing vampire power: If when you switch off the appliance or gadget there is a lit display on, then your gadget is drawing vam...

Hello, Friends! Protecting Your Family and Home Recently there have been a number of home break-ins and auto thefts in our Charleston communities. Last week in Cane Bay, cars were broken into and one was even taken from the driveway of one family while they were packing for vacation. Thanks to law enforcement the vehicle was found, unfortunately for the owner of the vehicle their vacation money was in the vehicle at the time of the theft and was not retrieved. Home Security Monitoring There are lots of do it yourself options for home security that can save you money like the nest security doorbell monitor or the  SimpliSafe Home Security System . There are also professionally installed systems that may save you time and effort. Special Offer In light of recent events we have partnered up with ADT to offer all current and past Cardinal Home Inspection customers and agents access to exclusive Home Security off...

If you have a fireplace (or are considering buying a house which has a fireplace), you probably know how nice an amenity that a fireplace can be. It is a wonderful place to gather the family and guests around, it provides warmth and can add stunning ambiance to your home. But traditional wood-burning fireplaces are not energy efficient, and if not operated properly, they can be very dangerous. This article discusses: 1. how a fireplace works, 2. how to improve it’s energy efficiency, 3. what typically goes wrong with fireplaces, and 4. the routine maintenance you should do for your fireplace. How A Fireplace Works Despite their appearance of being all warm and cozy, fireplaces tend to be very inefficient for home heating. In fact, the energy efficiencies of fireplaces typically range from only 10% to a minus 10%. The reason the efficiency can be below zero is that the fire draws in heated air from inside the home and vents it up the chimney. In ot...