Retrofitting your home through improvements in safety and energy efficiency is always a good idea. You can never invest too much in making your home a safer place, especially if you have kids. Furthermore, by making your home more energy-efficient, you won’t only contribute to saving the environment but you’ll also reduce your energy bills significantly. And the best thing about it is that none of these projects are going to drain your budget and take days to finish. With this in mind, let’s take a look at six retrofits that might just be what your home needs.

SAFETY

Smoke alarms

Every single year, about 2,000 people in the United States die in residential fires. With this being said, it’s obvious that you’ll want to be prepared for a fire emergency. By having smoke alarms installed, you’ll be able to detect a fire early, which can mean the difference between life and death. Installing smoke alarms isn’t too difficult, just don’t forget to test them once in a while in order to make sure they’ll go off in case of a fire.

Deadbolts

Another thing you have to be careful about are burglaries. A typical victim of a burglary suffers a loss of about $2,000 which is definitely something you’ll want to avoid. And since most of the burglars enter through the front and back door, installing deadbolts is always recommended. You can have a residential locksmith install these for you or if you’re handy with tools, you can choose to do it yourself.

Lighting

Slips and falls tend to occur as a result of insufficient lighting. Not only this, but burglars are more likely to target a home with less lighting as there are more potential hiding places for them. Therefore, when trying to make your home a safer place, you’ll want to think about installing new lighting options in your home. No matter which type of light you choose, make sure you go for LED bulbs, since these last longer and use less energy.

ENERGY EFFICIENCY

Thermostat

Installing a programmable thermostat is one of the best ways to make your home more eco-friendly. This way, your heater or air conditioner will run only when they’re actually needed. Furthermore, new thermostats can show you your energy use history, which allows you to compare over time and adjust your thermostat’s settings to conserve more energy.

Energy efficient appliances

Old appliances don’t only break more often but they also tend to use much more energy than the ones currently available on the market. There are energy star certified appliances that have been specially designed to help homeowners save more energy. Therefore, if you’ve been thinking about replacing your fridge, oven, or washing machine, you should make sure the ones you buy are as energy efficient as possible.

Solar panels

By installing solar panels on your flat roof, you’ll produce your own electricity and significantly reduce the cost of your energy bills. And as we get further into the green movement, more and more people decide to hire experts from a place like www.energyrenovationcenter.com/buying-solar-panels/ to install solar panels on their rooftops.

But what makes a good solar panel, you might ask? Simply check out these Sydney-based experts for solar panels, who have installed over 3,000 systems and over the years analysed and assessed the range of brands and their solar panel ranges, and have now narrowed it down to offering only the very best in energy efficient systems from the leading manufacturers and brands.

If you’re into DIY, installing all of these may just be a perfect home improvement project for you. On the other hand, if you don’t have enough free time or you simply want to save yourself the trouble, you can always have experts install these for you.