Putting Lights Up Is the Easy Part. Here Is What People Forget.

By the middle of November, the question is usually whether anyone can hang lights this weekend. The honest answer by then is usually no, and not because anyone is precious about scheduling. The good weekends are gone, and whoever is asking is about to spend a Saturday on a ladder in the dark.

So this is the month to decide, whichever way you decide. Here is what actually matters, including the parts nobody mentions until it goes wrong.

White lights along the eaves at night.

The circuit, not the lights

Almost every holiday light problem we get called about is electrical, not decorative.

The run outside your house is on an outdoor circuit with a GFCI, the outlet with the test and reset buttons. That device is doing a job: it cuts power when moisture gets where it should not. Which means in December, when the first rain hits, it will trip. If your lights die all at once on a wet night, that is usually what happened, and it is the system working.

Before anything goes up, push test and push reset on the outdoor outlets. Check the covers still close over a plug. And if you are running several strings off one outlet, add up what they draw. LED strings are forgiving. The old incandescent ones are not, and half the ceiling-mounted disasters we have seen started with four heavy strings on one circuit.

Weatherproof in-use cover over GFCI outlet on stucco wall. Work by Construction Hub in Los Angeles. — An outdoor GFCI under an in-use cover, the bubble type that stays closed with a cord plugged in.

Clips, never staples and never nails

Gutter clips and shingle clips cost almost nothing and they come off in January without leaving anything behind.

A staple through the wire is a hole in the insulation, sitting outside, in the rain. A nail through the fascia is a hole in the board that rots the gutter line, which is a much more expensive problem than the one it solved. We have replaced fascia boards that were fine until somebody decorated them.

The second story is a different job

A single-story front is a ladder, an afternoon and a helper holding the base.

A second story over an entry, a wide facade, or two layers of lights is a different thing: a taller ladder, two people, and a lot of time spent moving the ladder rather than hanging anything. That is why a quote for a two-story house is not double a one-story quote. Most of the cost is the reach, not the wire.

If a price for a two-story front sounds like a one-story price, ask what part they are planning to skip.

House eaves lit with purple and pink LED lights. Work by Construction Hub in Los Angeles. — House eaves lit with purple and pink LED lights.

The part everyone forgets until January

Taking them down.

It is cold, it is usually wet, the clips are brittle, and nobody wants to do it, which is why so many houses in this city still have lights up in March. When you get a quote, ask whether takedown is included and whether that includes coiling and boxing the strings so they work again next year. A tangled bag of lights in the garage is next year's argument.

If somebody hangs your lights and disappears until next November, they sold you half a job.

House lit in teal and purple at night with lights along the front walk. Work by Construction Hub in Los Angeles. — House lit in teal and purple at night with lights along the front walk.

Halloween first, and the trick worth knowing

Halloween is on the 31st, and the decoration goes up in the same places with the same ladders and the same outdoor circuit.

Here is the one piece of scheduling that saves people real time: have the Halloween decorations taken down and the holiday lights put up in the same visit week. Early November, one crew, one trip. You are not hunting twice, and you are not standing in your own driveway in the first week of November wondering where the ladder went.

Halloween witch figures on balcony lit with red floodlights. Work by Construction Hub in Los Angeles. — Witch figures on a second-floor balcony, lit with red floodlights.

What to decide this month

If you are hanging them yourself, buy the clips now and test the outdoor GFCI before the boxes come out of the garage.
If somebody else is hanging them, that decision is October. Early November fills by the middle of the month, and the people still available in late November are the ones nobody booked.
Either way, agree who is taking them down before anything goes up.