Snowbird Property Care
Handis snowbird property care is the October-to-April program for Seattle-area owners who leave for the winter — Palm Springs, Phoenix, Tucson, Naples, Sarasota, Maui — and need someone to walk the empty primary residence every week through the cold months — from $900 a year for the basic biweekly program to $2,400 for weekly visits with full winterize, storm-response priority, spring restart, and a punch-list day. The work runs as one program across seven months. October — winterize the house (hose bibs insulated, irrigation drained, sump pump tested, thermostat held above 55, water shut at the main if you choose). November through April — weekly or biweekly walkthroughs with the same plumbing-first attention. Late April or early May — spring restart the week before you fly home: heat back on, water back on, fridge cold, mail sorted on the counter.
Service
How Snowbird Property Care Works
Five phases every Handis snowbird program runs through — October winterization the week you leave, weekly or biweekly walkthroughs through the cold months, post-storm response visits within 24 hours, a deferred-maintenance log built across the winter, and a spring restart the week before you fly home.
October Winterization Visit
One scheduled visit the week you leave — hose bibs drained and insulated, irrigation drained, sump pump tested, thermostat set to 55, water heater on vacation mode, detectors tested and batteries swapped. Main water shutoff either left on (we monitor) or shut down (we restart in spring). Photo report covers every completed task.
Weekly or Biweekly Walkthroughs
Same walkthrough as the vacation-home program — exterior perimeter, interior room-by-room, plumbing visual under every fixture, water heater pan, sump pump indicator, thermostat reading, mail retrieval, curb-appeal reset. Same-day photo report. Weekly is the default for snowbird programs; biweekly works only for owners with a robust water shutoff and a low-risk profile.
Storm Response Within 24 Hours
Weekly programs include post-storm visits within 24 hours of any National Weather Service alert that hits the property's ZIP — windstorm, atmospheric river, ice event, snow event. Crawl space, freezer status, downed gutters, branches on roof, tree across the driveway. Photos and damage assessment land that same day.
Deferred-Maintenance Log Builds Across the Winter
The walkthroughs build a single rolling log of stuff that loosened, sagged, or pulled across the winter. Nothing is mid-winter fixed (the wrong weather window for caulk, paint, deck work). The log lands with the spring restart so you know what is coming before you land.
Spring Restart and Punch-List Day
One spring restart visit the week before your return — thermostat back, water back on at the main with a careful bleed and leak check, irrigation re-programmed, sump test, hose bibs un-insulated, fridge to cold, mail sorted on the counter. Premium program adds a full punch-list day — the deferred-maintenance log gets tackled in the handyman scope, anything beyond it quoted with a contractor recommendation.
Snowbird Property Care Pricing
Pricing depends on the cadence (weekly vs biweekly), the property size, and any add-ons (pool drain-down, well system shutoff, multi-building property). The October winterization and the spring restart are included in every snowbird program. Properties past the standard Seattle metro radius carry a travel premium quoted before the program starts. Request a free estimate for an accurate quote.
Tell us where you are wintering and what the house leaves looking like — we will quote the seven-month program.
Why Pacific Northwest Snowbirds Book Handis
A snowbird program is one continuous job that runs from the week you leave to the week you fly home, not seven months of disconnected drive-bys. The winterization in October sets up everything the walkthroughs check across the winter — the hose bibs we insulated, the sump pump we tested, the thermostat we set. Each weekly walkthrough confirms the prior week is still holding (the sump still cycles, the heat is still at 55, no slow leak under any sink), flags new stuff for the log, and runs the storm response when a windstorm comes through. The spring restart undoes the winterize and tackles the log. The owners land into a working house, not a list. The same handyman runs all seven months — the notes from October are in his head every walkthrough through April.
Estimate
Tell us where the Seattle-area house is, where you are wintering (Palm Springs, Arizona, Florida, Hawaii), the rough size and age of the house, what cadence you want (weekly or biweekly), what is on the property (pool, well, irrigation, sump pump, multi-building), and how the access works (key, lockbox, smart lock, alarm code). We send a clear seven-month estimate.
Customer Reviews
Snowbird property care reviews from real Handis customers across Seattle and the Eastside.
We are in Arizona October to April. Handis winterized in October, sent weekly photo reports through the winter, caught a slow toilet leak in January from the basement walk, scheduled a plumber, and did the spring restart visit the week before we landed. House was exactly how we left it.
Palm Springs every winter for the last seven years. Switched to Handis three winters ago after the prior service drive-by'd the same driveway for half a season and never caught a slow drip in the crawl space. Handis' tech caught a similar one in their second walkthrough. Different game entirely.
First winter in Maui. The October winterize visit included a checklist neither I nor my husband would have remembered — irrigation lines drained, sump pump tested with a bucket of water, fridge set to vacation. Photos of each task. Through the winter the weekly reports came in on schedule. Spring restart had the heat on and the fridge cold the day we landed.
Bellevue house, Florida from November to April. The premium program with the punch-list day was the upgrade. The deferred-maintenance log accumulated through the winter — three caulk seams, a deck board, a sticky deadbolt, a dryer-vent screen — and on the punch-list day after the restart the tech tackled all of it. We landed into a finished house, not a list.
Mercer Island, third winter on the program. December atmospheric river dropped four inches in 24 hours, crawl space hit the sump pump hard. Storm-response visit caught the pump cycling continuously, breaker flipped from the load. Photo report had a picture of the pump float and the breaker panel. Electrician booked the next morning. The basement stayed dry.
Frequently Asked Questions
Common questions about Handis snowbird property care.