If you split your time between Fort Myers and somewhere up north, you already know the routine: pack the car, close up the house, and hope everything's fine when you get back in the fall. Plumbing is one of the few things in an empty house that can quietly fail for weeks before anyone notices. A slow leak that would get caught in a day or two in an occupied home can run for months in a vacant one. By the time a neighbor or property manager spots it, you're looking at real water damage instead of a simple repair.
None of this requires a major project. It's a short list of things worth doing before you lock the door, and a couple of things worth having someone check on periodically while you're gone.
Shut Off The Main Water Supply
This is the single most effective thing you can do. If the main supply is off, a failed supply line, a cracked fitting, or a worn washing machine hose can't flood the house, because there's no pressure behind it. Most homes have a shutoff valve near the water meter or where the main line enters the house; if you don't know where yours is, this is worth confirming with a plumber before you leave for the season, not after something's already gone wrong.
Shutting off the main doesn't protect against every failure (a full tank of stored hot water can still drain out if a fitting fails), but it removes the biggest risk: an ongoing, unmonitored supply of pressurized water feeding a leak indefinitely.
Consider Your Water Heater
If you're shutting off the main supply for an extended absence, it's worth turning your water heater to vacation mode or off entirely, especially for a gas unit. Leaving a water heater running with no one using hot water for months is unnecessary wear and an unnecessary cost. For a tank-style heater, turning it down (rather than fully off) is often the simpler choice for shorter absences, since it avoids having to relight a pilot light on some older units when you return.
Quick check before you go: if your water heater is more than 10 years old, an extended shutdown is a reasonable time to also consider whether it's worth replacing before you're relying on it again next season, rather than finding out it's failing the week you get back.
Run Water Through Every Drain Trap Before You Leave
Every sink, tub, and floor drain has a trap, the curved section of pipe that holds a small amount of water to block sewer gas from entering the house. Over a long absence, that water can evaporate, especially in Florida's heat, and you can come home to a sewer smell that has nothing to do with an actual plumbing problem. Running water through every drain for a few seconds right before you leave resets that seal for as long as possible.
Have Someone Check On The House
A neighbor, property manager, or house-sitter who can glance at the property every couple of weeks is worth arranging if you don't already have one. They don't need plumbing expertise, just the ability to notice standing water, a running toilet, a musty smell, or a water bill that seems unusually high if you can share access to it remotely. Catching a problem at week three instead of week twelve is the difference between a minor repair and a major one.
Heading Out Of Town?
We can do a pre-departure check and confirm everything's shut off correctly.
Don't Forget Irrigation And Outdoor Fixtures
If you have an irrigation system, decide whether it should keep running on a schedule or be shut off along with everything else. A backflow preventer left active with no one checking on it periodically is generally fine, but an irrigation controller malfunctioning while you're gone for months can run up a serious water bill before anyone notices. Outdoor hose bibs and any exterior fixtures should get the same "shut off if you're not sure" treatment as the interior plumbing.
What A Pre-Departure Plumbing Check Actually Covers
For homeowners who'd rather have a professional confirm everything before a long absence, a pre-departure check typically covers the main shutoff valve, the water heater, visible supply lines under sinks and behind toilets, and any known trouble spots like an older washing machine connection. It's a straightforward visit, and it's considerably cheaper than discovering a failure after the fact.
What About Pets, Plants, And The AC?
Plumbing isn't the only system that needs attention before a long absence, but it does interact with a few others in ways worth knowing. Turning off the water heater is generally safe, but if you're leaving the air conditioning running (which you should, to control humidity and prevent mold in a closed-up Florida house), make sure the condensate drain line is clear before you go. A clogged AC condensate line can back up and overflow just like any other drain, and it's an easy thing to overlook since it's not part of the household plumbing system most people think about.
A Note On Vacation Rental Properties
If the home you're closing up is a rental between guests rather than your own seasonal residence, the same principles apply, but the stakes are a little different. A property manager checking between bookings should know where the main shutoff is and what a normal water bill looks like for that unit, so an unexplained spike gets caught quickly rather than discovered at the next turnover. We work with property managers across our service area on exactly this kind of standing arrangement, and our commercial plumbing service covers work-order-based accounts for multiple properties.
The Cost Of Getting This Wrong
It's worth being honest about what's actually at stake here. A supply line failure with the main water still on can run continuously for the entire time a home sits empty. In a two- or three-month absence, that's not a puddle, it's potentially thousands of gallons of water sitting under flooring, inside walls, and soaking into a slab foundation. Beyond the water damage itself, prolonged moisture in Florida's heat and humidity creates ideal conditions for mold, which turns a plumbing problem into a much larger remediation project. None of that is meant to be alarming for its own sake. It's simply the reason a ten-minute shutoff check before you leave is worth doing every single time, even if nothing ever goes wrong.
Coming Home: What To Check First
- Turn the main water supply back on slowly, and listen for any unusual sounds at the meter or under sinks.
- Check under every sink and behind every toilet for dampness before assuming everything's fine.
- Run each drain for a minute to clear out any lingering odor and re-establish trap seals.
- If your water heater was off, give it time to fully heat before assuming it's not working, rather than calling it broken prematurely.
Southwest Florida's seasonal population swings mean this is a genuinely common situation for us, not a niche request. If you'd rather have someone else double-check the shutoff and water heater before you lock up for the season, that's a quick, inexpensive visit that can save a much more expensive one later. Our leak detection service is also worth considering if you're coming home to any sign that something happened while you were away, and homes with an older water heater nearing the end of its life are often better off replaced before a long absence than left to fail while no one's watching.
If you're leaving a property in Cape Coral for the season, canal-front homes in particular are worth a shutoff check given how much the ground around them shifts over time.