Fire Prevention Week is October 6th through the 12th this year. The theme of Fire Prevention Week is Preventing Kitchen Fires. As a landlord or property manager, fire prevention should be on the top of your list of priorities. According to NFPA.org, in 2010, cooking caused 44% of reported home fires.
A few tips to help prevent a fire on a rental property are:
- Provide fire extinguishers for all rental units. When a tenant moves out, makes sure to check the extinguisher to ensure it is up to code.
- Annually check all fire alarms and smoke detectors.
- Prohibit smoking inside the rental property. This will not only help prevent fires, it may also add value to your rental units as the unit will not have a cigarette odor when the current tenant leaves.
- Make sure all grills used on balconies or near buildings are electric grills only and are up to code.
- Conduct an annual inspection to check the property for flammable material near heaters, faulty wiring, check dryer vents for lint build up, inspect fireplaces and heating and venting systems to make sure everything is as safe as possible.
Besides cooking fires, additional causes for residential fires include smoking, heating and electrical fires. There are no guarantees for preventing all fires on rental properties. There are however, actions landlords and property managers can take to minimize such exposures.
Source: Reproduced from NFPA’s Fire Prevention Week website, www.firepreventionweek.org. ©2013 NFPA.
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