Winterize Your Pipes
Tom Hanks, owner, 24/7 Express Handyman Service · Updated September 2026
Keep the thermostat at 55°F or higher and know where your main shutoff is — that covers most of what winterizing pipes means.
The two things that actually matter
IBHS recommends never letting a home's thermostat drop below 55°F, occupied or not — that single habit prevents more frozen pipes than any amount of pipe insulation on its own.
The second is knowing where the main shutoff is before you need it. If a line does freeze and split, the difference between a contained drip and a flooded floor is how fast someone can turn the water off.
Where pipes actually freeze
Not in the middle of a heated room — along exterior walls, in an unheated garage, in a crawlspace, or wherever a line runs closer to outside air than to the furnace. Those are the runs worth insulating first if you're only doing a few.
A hose bib left connected to a garden hose over winter is one of the most common single points of failure: the trapped water in the hose backs up into the line behind the frost-free valve and splits it.
Call now
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Sources
- IBHS Winter Weather Ready Guide news release — retrieved 2026-09-19