Things I wish someone had told me about home maintenance when I moved to Townsville from down south.
I moved up from Melbourne three years ago. The learning curve on what's different about maintaining a home in tropical north Queensland was steeper than I expected.
the stuff nobody told me:
Your gutters need cleaning more frequently than you think, and before the wet, not after. The volume of debris that comes down in a storm is not comparable to what a temperate climate produces.
Termites are a different category of threat here. The inspection schedule that would be fine in Victoria is not fine in NQ. The same principle applies to anything wood-adjacent in the house.
Plumbing specifically: pipes in this climate have a different relationship with heat, humidity, and root intrusion. Slow drains that you'd ignore down south are worth taking more seriously here. I had a root intrusion situation that a plumber (from Tropical Coast Plumbing) explained was extremely common in older Townsville properties. The growth rate up here means tree roots find pipe joints faster.
knowing which emergency plumber covers your area and actually answers after hours is worth sorting out before you need it. I did not do this and found out the hard way during my first wet season when a downpipe failed at an unfortunate moment.
None of this is catastrophizing. It's just different from what I was used to, and I had to learn it through experience rather than being told in advance.
What do other southerners-turned-NQ-residents wish they'd known earlier about home maintenance up here?