Between flight bookings, packing and the school-holiday rush, one question usually arrives too late: who is looking after the house? In Dubai, that question matters more than in most cities. Summer heat in the high 40s, heavy humidity and weeks of closed windows can turn an empty home into a problem you only discover at the front door when you return.

Short answer: before you leave Dubai for the summer, get your AC serviced and leave it running at a moderate temperature, check your water supply and plumbing, clear the kitchen and bins, unplug non-essential electronics, secure the home and deliveries, and arrange for someone reliable to inspect the property while you are away.

This guide walks through each of those steps in detail. Use it as a pre-travel home checklist, share it with your family, or hand parts of it to a professional home care team so you can travel without the background worry.

A home left empty in a cooler climate mostly needs to be locked up. A home left empty in Dubai between June and September is a different story, because three things work against it at once.

Heat. Closed-up apartments and villas heat up quickly. Heat stresses AC units, dries out plants and shortens the life of electronics and furniture finishes.

Humidity. Dubai's summer humidity is the quiet culprit. When cooling stops, moisture builds up in walls, soft furnishings, wardrobes and AC components. That is how musty smells, mould spots and swollen wood appear.

Nobody around to notice. A slow tap leak, a blocked drain, a tripped breaker or an AC that stops cooling is a small inconvenience when you are home. Over four to six weeks, it can become water damage, spoiled food or a pest problem.

Local reporting backs this up. In a Khaleej Times feature on what happens to Dubai homes during long summer holidays, residents returning after around six weeks described bad smells, weak cooling, leaks and mould, and AC technicians and cleaners reported packed schedules in the weeks after the holiday season. One returning resident said that next time he would get the AC serviced before leaving and make sure somebody checks the apartment while the family is away. That is exactly the habit this checklist is designed to build.