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By Platinum Team April 6, 2013

Common Electrical Wiring Problems And Your Home Warranty

Purchasing your very own home is an exciting thing. It’s probably something that you have been looking forward to for your entire life. As a homeowner, you will quickly find that there are a lot of things around your home that need maintenance. No matter when your home was built, it is important to keep up on maintenance and be aware when something is going wrong. If something does go wrong, hopefully you have a good home warranty in place to help you take care of it. Wiring problems are one area of home maintenance where things can go wrong whether or not you had your home wired professionally, recently, or a long time ago. It’s true that your home likely had to pass some sort of inspection when it was built, but that doesn’t make it immune to problems down the road. Here are some common electrical wiring problems you could find around your home and how your home warranty can cover them.

Sometimes the power goes off and there seems to be no apparent reason. You look all over for the source, but can’t seem to identify what would cause the power in your home to go off. Once you check the circuit breakers, you may discover that the breakers have been tripped. There can be various reasons why the breakers in your home would trip. Sometimes the breakers are wired incorrectly, there is a poor connection with the breaker, or there is some issue with the outlet connected to the breaker.

Overloading can be another wiring problem that can cause issues in your home. Overload is when you have too many things going on at once, such as having too many lamps plugged into your wall or extension cords running through your home. This can cause different items and components to heat up and could cause a fire—or trip your breakers, as mentioned above.

High wattage bulbs are another common problem. Some homeowners disregard the wattage limit on a given light fixture and put in bulbs that carry a lot more wattage than necessary. This could cause your bulbs to burn out faster, but it also makes the light base extremely hot—which could also put you at risk for a fire in your home.

No matter how many issues the wiring in your home has, you should still find your electricity bill is staying around normal. If you notice your bill is extremely high, you might want to find out how much your home is actually using and whether or not your meter needs fixing. When your wiring is affecting your bills, it can be advisable to get help identifying the problem as quickly as possible.

Home warranties can be useful in situations where your home is having wiring issues. Although a warranty is not exactly like an insurance policy, it can still protect you and your possessions. With a home warranty in place, you may be able to get someone to come out and fix your wiring problems free of cost to you, for instance. If the wiring problems affected certain appliances in your home that are covered under your home warranty, you may also be able to get those replaced at no cost to you. When you purchase your home warranty, you should make sure you know what it does and does not cover. Having a home warranty that covers electrical wiring can be extremely useful, however, as wiring problems are bound to occur eventually no matter how old or new your home may be.

Owning a home is very exciting, but it also brings with it a lot of responsibility. There are many different common wiring problems you can run into with your home, from tripping breakers to unexplained electricity bills and more. Getting home warranty coverage over the wiring in your home can be very beneficial, especially if you have no idea why you are having such wiring problems. Before purchasing your home warranty make sure you understand exactly what it covers. This way when problems arise, you can rest assured that your warranty will back you up.