Map the home and its shutoffs
Locate the systems, controls, records, and contacts needed before a leak, outage, alarm, or equipment failure.
Simple Maintenance Tips for New Homeowners
From This Old House. Watch here or open it on YouTube .
During the course primer, listen for ideas that change how you approach “Map the home and its shutoffs.” Pause once to capture a useful point, then apply it while producing a labeled home-system map, equipment inventory, shutoff photos, manual index, and emergency contact page.What this lesson is really solving.
Locate the systems, controls, records, and contacts needed before a leak, outage, alarm, or equipment failure. This is lesson 1 because later decisions depend on a labeled home-system map, equipment inventory, shutoff photos, manual index, and emergency contact page. A home is a collection of connected systems; the map tells you what can be isolated safely. Use your own numbers, files, environment, and constraints so the result survives outside the course.
Understand the idea before touching the steps.
A home is a collection of connected systems; the map tells you what can be isolated safely.
Follow these steps in order.
Take the action in each step; then use the deliverable below to prove the lesson is finished.
- 1
Walk the property and map water service and fixtures, electrical panel, heating and cooling, drains, ventilation, alarms, appliances, exterior drainage, and access points.
- 2
Locate and label appropriate water, electrical, and other authorized shutoffs without operating unfamiliar or hazardous controls.
- 3
Match equipment names, model and serial numbers, filters, breakers, manuals, warranties, and service contacts.
- 4
Photograph locations and create an emergency page that another household member can understand.
See the standard in context.
Rae learns the outdoor valve is not the unit’s main water shutoff, labels the correct closet valve, and asks building management to confirm the shared gas procedure. The learner saves a labeled home-system map, equipment inventory, shutoff photos, manual index, and emergency contact page and notes the evidence or assumption behind the choice so it can be reviewed and improved later.
Inspect before you move on.
- The finished work visibly includes a labeled home-system map, equipment inventory, shutoff photos, manual index, and emergency contact page.
- You tested the work against this common failure: Waiting for a leak or outage to discover that a hidden valve is seized, mislabeled, or inaccessible.
- Another person could verify this mastery standard: Another household member can locate the main water control, electrical panel, safety alarms, and service contacts from your map.
Your deliverable
A labeled home-system map, equipment inventory, shutoff photos, manual index, and emergency contact page.
Watch for this
Waiting for a leak or outage to discover that a hidden valve is seized, mislabeled, or inaccessible.
Prove it—don’t just recognize it.
Another household member can locate the main water control, electrical panel, safety alarms, and service contacts from your map.
Quick knowledge check
Answer from the lesson—not from confidence alone. Score at least 2 of 3 to unlock completion.
This curriculum-aligned check is scored automatically and stored with your account when signed in. It is an objective learning signal, but it has not yet been independently validated as a standardized assessment.
Tools, templates, and references
Pass the knowledge check above first.
Completion unlocks after a score of 2 out of 3. Then confirm that you produced the lesson deliverable.
Go to the knowledge check