One of the best ways to celebrate winter is curling up on the couch with a hot drink and a good book. One of the worst ways is frantically calling an HVAC maintenance specialist during the first snowstorm of the year because your heat has suddenly stopped working. Yet many Treasure Valley homeowners still skip basic maintenance and home checks each season until they have an emergency on their hands.

That’s a hard and expensive lesson to learn–and one you can avoid with a few easy steps each fall. Below, we’ve outlined everything you need to keep in mind to get your Boise-area home ready for a cozy, emergency-free winter.

Inspect Your Roof

You may not be thinking of selling your home at the moment, but simple annual maintenance will save you a

Driven by a short supply of new listings, Treasure Valley home prices continue to hover at near-record levels. The Ada County median single-family home price rose to $534,950 in September, up 31% from last year and $4,450 from just last month. Homebuyers in Canyon County faced a median home price of $422,000 – a 36% annual increase and up $11,500 from August. Both counties finished September with their second-highest price to date.

Let’s take a closer look at data from several of our local markets.

• Boise’s median single-family home price was $495,000 in September, a $100,000 jump (up 26%) from last year.
• Meridian set a new median sales record with $546,000. That’s $146,000 over last September’s sales price, or a 37% increase.
• Hitting