Optimize your Thermostat Settings
There seems to be a constant debate about the best ways to save with your thermostat. For example, does it take more energy to keep your house at a constant temperature or to re-heat/cool your home by lowering/raising your thermostat settings every time you are away? What should your settings be at in the winter and summer? Are programmable thermostats worth the price tag?
The answer of course is going to be different for everyone. I live in a small condo, which can heat/cool in a relatively short amount of time, so for use it is definitely cheaper to adjust our thermostat for when we are home versus away. I actually tested which would be the best method by adjusting our thermostat and then took meter readings. It’s pretty simple to do, just make sure you run your test with nothing major running (dryer, dishwasher, etc.) and get a reading of how many kW it takes to run your home for an hour without your heater/AC on, this way you have a base to gauge your readings off of.
Thermostat Settings
Because it is much more economically for us to adjust our homes thermostat every time we leave, it was worth it for us to purchase a programmable thermostat. For around $50-80, you can get a thermostat that will adjust automatically for you while you are sleeping, away, and home. Most of them will even allow you to program the weekends separately from the weekdays.
During the winter, we set our programmable thermostat set to 67 degrees while we are home, 63 degrees while we are sleeping, and 62 while we are away from work. You may be thinking 67 degrees, that ‘s way too cold! It may be for some people, but I often argue if we can really tell the difference between a few degrees. Can you tell the difference outside when its 74 degrees compared to 71 degrees? I can ‘t, for some reason we are more sensitive in a controlled climate (it ‘s in our head). Also, I wear a sweatshirt and pants at home during the winter, which also helps live comfortably.
In the summer, we set our thermostat to 79 while we are home and 83 while we are sleeping and at work. I would probably set it even higher while we are away, but our dog wouldn‘t be pleased. Again, this may be too hot for some, but for us it ‘s become the norm. Dressing appropriate and properly placing fans around your home definitely is key in the summer.
What settings do you use? $
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Comments
We keep our home at 60 during the day (we work from home) and 55 at night. People always say, “that’s too cold”, but we remind them that it’s winter and you should be wearing warm clothes. I can’t believe people keep their homes so warm in the winter. I know one couple that keeps their house colder in the summer via air conditioning than they keep it in the winter.
I agree with ya here. I have saved a lot on the utility bills with this one. Putting plastic over your windows in the winter is also a surefire solution. FinanceTrail
We used to keep our thermostat at 63-68, depending on the time of day and if we felt warm or cool (after adjusting our clothing).
Now that we have a newborn (yay!) it’s set at 72 and sometimes I kick it up a degree or two.
I know he’d be able to tell the difference if I lowered it a few degrees. He has no fat and is just too little for me to keep it any cooler.
We recently bought a house and just got our 2nd gas bill…it has doubled in the last month! I almost had a heart-attack when I saw the difference between last month and this month. So my fiance lowered the thermostat to a consistent temperature (we can always put on more sweatshirts). How much of a savings are we looking at to keep the temperature the same instead of going up when we are home and down when we are at work?
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I keep the house at 69 when I am home and 62 when I am gone or sleeping. Most of the time that is a really comfortable temp.