Intown Atlanta Older Home Repair Guide

A lot of the housing stock inside the Perimeter was built with plaster walls, solid wood doors, site-built trim and wood windows. Those materials last a long time, but they respond to the weather. Wood swells when the air is wet and shrinks when it dries out. Plaster is rigid, so when the framing behind it shifts a little with the seasons, it cracks instead of flexing the way drywall does.

None of this means something is wrong with the house. It means maintenance works best on a calendar. If you know that doors will swell in summer and gutters will clog in fall, you can get ahead of both instead of reacting after water or wear has already done damage.

Atlanta springs are famous for the yellow pollen that coats everything for a few weeks. It is mostly a cleaning problem, but it is also the best moment to do a slow walk around the outside of the house, because you will be out there washing porches and screens anyway.

While you are out there, look at the bottom of porch columns, the ends of fascia boards, window sills and the lower edge of door frames. Those are the spots where water sits longest, so they are where wood rot usually starts. Press gently with a screwdriver. If the wood feels soft or crumbles, it needs attention before the summer storms. Spring is also a good time to check window screens, re-secure loose porch railings and look for peeling paint on trim, since bare wood soaks up moisture fast.

Inside, note any new cracks in plaster that appeared over the winter. Fine spiderweb cracks above doorways and at corners are common in older homes and are usually cosmetic. Cracks that are wide, growing quickly or paired with doors that suddenly will not close deserve a closer look from someone who can tell the difference.

Summer is when older Atlanta houses feel the humidity most. Original wood doors and window sashes swell and start rubbing, and a door that closed fine in March may need a shoulder to latch by July. The usual fix is not replacement. Tightening loose hinge screws, adjusting the strike plate, and planing or shimming the door so it clears the frame will solve most cases. Sealing the bare edge after planing matters, because an unsealed edge will soak up moisture and swell again.

Afternoon thunderstorms are the other summer story. Heavy rain finds every weak spot: clogged downspouts, gaps in exterior caulk, cracked paint on sills. After a big storm, check ceilings under bathrooms and porches for new stains, look for water pooling near the foundation, and make sure gutters are still attached firmly. Bathrooms also take a beating in humid months, so it is worth checking grout and caulk around tubs and showers before small gaps let water behind the tile.

Intown Atlanta has a lot of mature trees, and in neighborhoods like Virginia-Highland and Morningside the oaks drop leaves, acorns and seed pods into gutters all through the fall. Clogged gutters overflow, and the water lands right where you do not want it: on fascia boards, porch steps and the soil next to the foundation.

Most homes benefit from a gutter cleaning in late fall once the bulk of the leaves are down, and some heavily shaded houses need a second pass. Fall is also a good window for exterior paint touch-ups and fresh caulk around windows and trim, because temperatures are mild and the air is drier than in summer. If you have a deck or a wood fence, give it a quick check for loose boards and popped nails before the wet months.

Atlanta winters are generally mild, which makes it easy to forget that the city still gets a few hard freezes most years. Older homes with crawl spaces and pipes running along exterior walls are the most exposed. Before the first cold snap, disconnect garden hoses, cover outdoor spigots and make sure crawl space vents and doors are closed up the way they should be.

Winter is also the season for indoor projects. It is a good time to patch plaster, repaint a room, rehang a door, replace worn cabinet hardware, swap light fixtures or finally mount the TV. For landlords, the slower season can be the right moment to tackle the repair list in a rental between tenants.

Plenty of upkeep is fine to do yourself. Changing HVAC filters, cleaning screens, tightening hinge screws, re-caulking a tub, and touching up small paint scuffs are all reasonable weekend jobs. Clearing gutters on a one-story house is doable if you are comfortable on a ladder and have someone holding it.

It usually makes sense to call a pro when the job involves heights, older materials or a finish you do not want to ruin. Plaster patching is a good example: it takes practice to make a repair disappear on an old wall. The same goes for planing a heavy original door, replacing rotted trim so it matches the existing profile, or working on a two-story roofline. If you own a rental, a pro also saves time, because one visit can cover the whole make-ready list instead of several weekends.

Solve Handyman is a family-owned company based in Marietta that works on older homes and rentals across intown Atlanta. The team is insured, estimates are free, there is no trip fee, and same-day service is available when the schedule allows. If something we did is not right, we come back and redo it at no cost. We speak English, Portuguese and Spanish, which helps when a tenant, property manager or family member is the one meeting us at the door.

If you want to see the neighborhoods we cover and the repairs we handle most often, visit our Atlanta handyman page, linked at the end of this guide. You can also text photos of your list to (770) 744-7051 and we will tell you what is involved before anyone drives over.