Staying on top of home maintenance can be a genuine challenge. There’s so much to stay ahead of that it can leave even the most organized and well-intentioned homeowners feeling overwhelmed and falling behind.

For new homeowners, it’s a full-on assault of information from the moment you’re under contract. It’s a bit like hiking in the dark for the first time, unsettling and exciting at the same time. 

The learning curve is real. But thankfully there are some fun new ways to approach owning a home that don’t involve creating a spreadsheet, cracking open a planner, or scribbling out an old fashion to-do list. Today we have hundreds of apps related to home maintenance that can help us manage various aspects of our home, from paint colors to your investment as a whole.

But just how heavily should we rely on these home apps? We’re sharing our insights on which home maintenance apps out there are the most helpful and the pros and cons of using apps to manage your home.

Centriq

—

Ever go to install something, only to learn that your product is missing its installation instructions? Centriq was born from just this experience, created by two frustrated homeowners and now utilizing the “world’s largest curated collection of home appliance and troubleshooting support.” Scan barcodes to get manuals in an instant, organize appliance warranty information by room, watch how-to videos, get troubleshooting tips, and order parts directly from brands. 

Price 

• Free - $99.95 Annually

Fine Print

• Users can store their top 5 items for free using Centriq Beginner. The pricing goes up from there, starting with a “Baby” plan where you can add 15 items in 1 home for $17.95 per year, up to $99.95 per year for unlimited items across up to 3 homes. 

Best Value:

• The “Limited” plan is $29.95 per year and allows users to document 30 items in 1 home, which should cover the most basic items in a standard property.

Compatibility:

• Available for Apple and Android users.

Best Perks:

• Instant access to an extensive database of resources, including manual downloads.

Downsides:

• Centriq’s free option is very limited.

UpKept

—

Created by Consumer Reports, UpKept allows users to add their appliances and home systems - heating, cooling, electrical, etc - into a digital Home Hub that creates a plan and sets to-do lists and reminders. 

Price:

• Free for 30 Days, then $4.99/month

Fine Print:

• New users are required to opt-in to be charged automatically after the 30-day free trial is complete. 

Compatibility:

• Available for Apple and Android users.

Best Perks:

• Automated monthly to-do lists and reminders.

Downsides:

• No annual billing option or discount.

Angi

—

Homeowners can find top-rated home maintenance professionals on Angi, formerly Angie’s List, a long-time online resource for quickly scheduling home projects. Users can browse projects by category or direct search and can ultimately be matched to an established professional specializing in the type of work requested. It’s also just a great place to get ideas, inspiration, or tips on things like home organization, home security, or pest control.

Price:

• Free - $29.99 Annually

Fine Print:

• For $29.99 per year, users can sign up for the Angi Key membership which provides 20% off on certain home projects with fixed pricing.

Compatibility:

• Angi is a website and app and is available on all platforms.

Best Perks:

• The free membership is really all you need to search and book projects with professionals in your area, and the mobile app is very easy to use. 

Downsides:

• To browse anything, users have to create an Angi account and agree to the terms of the membership agreement, which might be a bit intimidating for someone just looking to get a sense of the platform.

Hometalk

—

If you love to browse DIY projects and explore how-to guides, Hometalk is the ultimate online resource and app for all things do it yourself. This platform is saturated with project ideas large and small, making it a great place to discover new ideas for how to transform your new home.

Price:

• Free 

Fine Print:

• None

Compatibility:

• Hometalk is a website and app and is available on all platforms.

Best Perks:

• Hometalk is a free and open resource that anyone can use to easily search for home project inspiration galore.

Downsides:

• Like many content-rich websites, there are a ton of ads all over the place and a huge amount of material to sift through.

HomeZada

—

HomeZada is a digital hub that allows users to organize the overall value of their home and its contents while also planning for things like maintenance, home insurance, and renovations. It blends home inventory control with a maintenance minder, while also capturing an overall picture of the home’s financial value as an asset.

Price:

• Free - $149/year

Fine Print:

• None of the maintenance or finance tools are available in the free version.

Compatibility:

• Available for Apple and Android users.

Best Perks:

• Compared to other home maintenance apps out there, the ability to analyze the total cost of home ownership and analyze asset value sets HomeZada apart.

Downsides:

Users are required to pay $79/year for the Premium Plan to access its best features.

Project Color by the Home Depot

—

Home Depot’s Project Color allows users to browse and match paint color options to help visualize spaces with easy access to paint sample ordering straight through the app. Users can upload photos to preview any color in their surroundings, save favorites, share them with friends and family, and match colors using their phone’s camera. 

Price:

• Free 

Fine Print:

• None

Compatibility:

• Available for Apple and Android users.

Best Perks:

• Not sure where to begin with colors? This app has all sorts of color combinations exampled to help sharpen the mood of your new interior.

Downsides:

• While there are a few fun resources on the app, such as a video tutorial showing how to calculate how much paint you need, it doesn’t have as many how-to videos or content in comparison to apps like Pinterest or Hometalk.

Room Planner

—

Room Planner allows users to quickly measure spaces and create floor plans with the same ease as an interior designer. This app pulls from a database of over 25,000 online products, helping with project cost estimates while laying out your new space. Add everything from colors, floor materials, and textures to round out your design. Looking for inspiration? Room Planner provides hundreds of inspiration room designs to get you started.

Price:

• $5.99/Weekly - $74.99/Annually

Fine Print:

• Your membership is automatically set to renew unless turned off.

Compatibility:

• Available for Apple and Android users.

Best Perks:

• No design experience? No problem! Room Planner’s website has various free tutorials on how to get started which don’t require a membership to preview.

Downsides:

• There is currently no free trial option. The only way to preview the app is to sign up for the $5.99 weekly membership which can also be converted to a $14.99 monthly or $74.99 annual subscription.

Pinterest

With over 400 million monthly users, Pinterest is one of the largest social platforms in the world. But it’s not really a social platform at all; it’s a search engine. And it’s especially great for homeowners due to its massive percentage of users sharing all things DIY and home-related inspiration.

Price:

• Free

Fine Print:

• Users are required to sign up for a free account with an email address to use any of its features.

Compatibility:

• Pinterest is a website and app and is available on all platforms.

Best Perks:

• Users can create “boards” - kind of like a digital version of an old-fashioned bulletin board - to save content around topics that interest them. There’s no limit to how many boards you create on Pinterest, which can be really useful for organizing different aspects of a project.

Downsides:

• Pinterest is unlike any other social media, and it can take a few minutes to understand how it all works. The good news is there are several tutorials out there showing how to get started.

The Pros and Cons of Using Apps to Manage Home Maintenance

—

Downloading an app can often seem like a quick and easy solution to whatever it is we’re trying to resolve or make easier in our lives. We all use them to varying degrees to manage everything from our social interactions, tracking our exercise, budgeting, listening to music, and basic things like not getting lost while driving.

But they’re just a support system, and they can’t solve everything. 

When it comes to home maintenance, sure, an app can remind you when to change your AC filter. But it’s not a replacement for a skilled home maintenance specialist who will inspect your entire system and tell you if there’s anything you should be prepared for down the line. 

Preventive maintenance is often the best way to save on the cost of your home and protect your investment, and these apps are only providing generalized recommendations and a one-size-fits-all approach. Each home has its own unique set of home maintenance needs, and there’s no app out there that can account for that.

What are some other pros and cons of home maintenance apps? Here are our main takeaways as longtime experts specializing in home maintenance in Boulder, Colorado.

Pros of Using Home Maintenance Apps

—

• Easy to use anytime and anywhere.

• Maintenance reminders on a device you check often.

• Ability to digitally archive important documents.

• Free/paid access to DIY ideas and how-to project ideas.

Cons of Using Home Maintenance Apps

—

• Reminders from apps are easy to ignore or don’t arrive at all if you’ve turned off push notifications.

• Some home maintenance apps are costly and might collectively take away hundreds of dollars that could be redirected to your actual home maintenance.

• If you choose to delete an app or fail to pay for your subscription, your information might be deleted and lost.

• Your user habits, not necessarily your direct personal information, are often tracked and sold to third-party companies.

• Using an app isn’t a substitute for a home maintenance expert who will look specifically at each aspect of your home and create a custom home care plan.

Want to learn how to best protect your home?

—

Explore the benefits of Willow Home’s subscription home maintenance plan, offering luxury home concierge services to residents of Boulder, Colorado.

Staying on top of home maintenance can be a genuine challenge. There’s so much to stay ahead of that it can leave even the most organized and well-intentioned homeowners feeling overwhelmed and falling behind.

For new homeowners, it’s a full-on assault of information from the moment you’re under contract. It’s a bit like hiking in the dark for the first time, unsettling and exciting at the same time. 

The learning curve is real. But thankfully there are some fun new ways to approach owning a home that don’t involve creating a spreadsheet, cracking open a planner, or scribbling out an old fashion to-do list. Today we have hundreds of apps related to home maintenance that can help us manage various aspects of our home, from paint colors to your investment as a whole.

But just how heavily should we rely on these home apps? We’re sharing our insights on which home maintenance apps out there are the most helpful and the pros and cons of using apps to manage your home.

Centriq

—

Ever go to install something, only to learn that your product is missing its installation instructions? Centriq was born from just this experience, created by two frustrated homeowners and now utilizing the “world’s largest curated collection of home appliance and troubleshooting support.” Scan barcodes to get manuals in an instant, organize appliance warranty information by room, watch how-to videos, get troubleshooting tips, and order parts directly from brands. 

Price 

• Free - $99.95 Annually

Fine Print

• Users can store their top 5 items for free using Centriq Beginner. The pricing goes up from there, starting with a “Baby” plan where you can add 15 items in 1 home for $17.95 per year, up to $99.95 per year for unlimited items across up to 3 homes. 

Best Value:

• The “Limited” plan is $29.95 per year and allows users to document 30 items in 1 home, which should cover the most basic items in a standard property.

Compatibility:

• Available for Apple and Android users.

Best Perks:

• Instant access to an extensive database of resources, including manual downloads.

Downsides:

• Centriq’s free option is very limited.

UpKept

—

Created by Consumer Reports, UpKept allows users to add their appliances and home systems - heating, cooling, electrical, etc - into a digital Home Hub that creates a plan and sets to-do lists and reminders. 

Price:

• Free for 30 Days, then $4.99/month

Fine Print:

• New users are required to opt-in to be charged automatically after the 30-day free trial is complete. 

Compatibility:

• Available for Apple and Android users.

Best Perks:

• Automated monthly to-do lists and reminders.

Downsides:

• No annual billing option or discount.

Angi

—

Homeowners can find top-rated home maintenance professionals on Angi, formerly Angie’s List, a long-time online resource for quickly scheduling home projects. Users can browse projects by category or direct search and can ultimately be matched to an established professional specializing in the type of work requested. It’s also just a great place to get ideas, inspiration, or tips on things like home organization, home security, or pest control.

Price:

• Free - $29.99 Annually

Fine Print:

• For $29.99 per year, users can sign up for the Angi Key membership which provides 20% off on certain home projects with fixed pricing.

Compatibility:

• Angi is a website and app and is available on all platforms.

Best Perks:

• The free membership is really all you need to search and book projects with professionals in your area, and the mobile app is very easy to use. 

Downsides:

• To browse anything, users have to create an Angi account and agree to the terms of the membership agreement, which might be a bit intimidating for someone just looking to get a sense of the platform.

Hometalk

—

If you love to browse DIY projects and explore how-to guides, Hometalk is the ultimate online resource and app for all things do it yourself. This platform is saturated with project ideas large and small, making it a great place to discover new ideas for how to transform your new home.

Price:

• Free 

Fine Print:

• None

Compatibility:

• Hometalk is a website and app and is available on all platforms.

Best Perks:

• Hometalk is a free and open resource that anyone can use to easily search for home project inspiration galore.

Downsides:

• Like many content-rich websites, there are a ton of ads all over the place and a huge amount of material to sift through.

HomeZada

—

HomeZada is a digital hub that allows users to organize the overall value of their home and its contents while also planning for things like maintenance, home insurance, and renovations. It blends home inventory control with a maintenance minder, while also capturing an overall picture of the home’s financial value as an asset.

Price:

• Free - $149/year

Fine Print:

• None of the maintenance or finance tools are available in the free version.

Compatibility:

• Available for Apple and Android users.

Best Perks:

• Compared to other home maintenance apps out there, the ability to analyze the total cost of home ownership and analyze asset value sets HomeZada apart.

Downsides:

Users are required to pay $79/year for the Premium Plan to access its best features.

Project Color by the Home Depot

—

Home Depot’s Project Color allows users to browse and match paint color options to help visualize spaces with easy access to paint sample ordering straight through the app. Users can upload photos to preview any color in their surroundings, save favorites, share them with friends and family, and match colors using their phone’s camera. 

Price:

• Free 

Fine Print:

• None

Compatibility:

• Available for Apple and Android users.

Best Perks:

• Not sure where to begin with colors? This app has all sorts of color combinations exampled to help sharpen the mood of your new interior.

Downsides:

• While there are a few fun resources on the app, such as a video tutorial showing how to calculate how much paint you need, it doesn’t have as many how-to videos or content in comparison to apps like Pinterest or Hometalk.

Room Planner

—

Room Planner allows users to quickly measure spaces and create floor plans with the same ease as an interior designer. This app pulls from a database of over 25,000 online products, helping with project cost estimates while laying out your new space. Add everything from colors, floor materials, and textures to round out your design. Looking for inspiration? Room Planner provides hundreds of inspiration room designs to get you started.

Price:

• $5.99/Weekly - $74.99/Annually

Fine Print:

• Your membership is automatically set to renew unless turned off.

Compatibility:

• Available for Apple and Android users.

Best Perks:

• No design experience? No problem! Room Planner’s website has various free tutorials on how to get started which don’t require a membership to preview.

Downsides:

• There is currently no free trial option. The only way to preview the app is to sign up for the $5.99 weekly membership which can also be converted to a $14.99 monthly or $74.99 annual subscription.

Pinterest

With over 400 million monthly users, Pinterest is one of the largest social platforms in the world. But it’s not really a social platform at all; it’s a search engine. And it’s especially great for homeowners due to its massive percentage of users sharing all things DIY and home-related inspiration.

Price:

• Free

Fine Print:

• Users are required to sign up for a free account with an email address to use any of its features.

Compatibility:

• Pinterest is a website and app and is available on all platforms.

Best Perks:

• Users can create “boards” - kind of like a digital version of an old-fashioned bulletin board - to save content around topics that interest them. There’s no limit to how many boards you create on Pinterest, which can be really useful for organizing different aspects of a project.

Downsides:

• Pinterest is unlike any other social media, and it can take a few minutes to understand how it all works. The good news is there are several tutorials out there showing how to get started.

The Pros and Cons of Using Apps to Manage Home Maintenance

—

Downloading an app can often seem like a quick and easy solution to whatever it is we’re trying to resolve or make easier in our lives. We all use them to varying degrees to manage everything from our social interactions, tracking our exercise, budgeting, listening to music, and basic things like not getting lost while driving.

But they’re just a support system, and they can’t solve everything. 

When it comes to home maintenance, sure, an app can remind you when to change your AC filter. But it’s not a replacement for a skilled home maintenance specialist who will inspect your entire system and tell you if there’s anything you should be prepared for down the line. 

Preventive maintenance is often the best way to save on the cost of your home and protect your investment, and these apps are only providing generalized recommendations and a one-size-fits-all approach. Each home has its own unique set of home maintenance needs, and there’s no app out there that can account for that.

What are some other pros and cons of home maintenance apps? Here are our main takeaways as longtime experts specializing in home maintenance in Boulder, Colorado.

Pros of Using Home Maintenance Apps

—

• Easy to use anytime and anywhere.

• Maintenance reminders on a device you check often.

• Ability to digitally archive important documents.

• Free/paid access to DIY ideas and how-to project ideas.

Cons of Using Home Maintenance Apps

—

• Reminders from apps are easy to ignore or don’t arrive at all if you’ve turned off push notifications.

• Some home maintenance apps are costly and might collectively take away hundreds of dollars that could be redirected to your actual home maintenance.

• If you choose to delete an app or fail to pay for your subscription, your information might be deleted and lost.

• Your user habits, not necessarily your direct personal information, are often tracked and sold to third-party companies.

• Using an app isn’t a substitute for a home maintenance expert who will look specifically at each aspect of your home and create a custom home care plan.

Want to learn how to best protect your home?

—

Explore the benefits of Willow Home’s subscription home maintenance plan, offering luxury home concierge services to residents of Boulder, Colorado.