House Temperature

[Disneyjamie]

How warm do you keep your house in the fall/winter to avoid high heating bills? Today our house is 61 degrees F, and it is awfully chilly. Just trying to see what we could do this winter with keeping costs low without being too cold. We do not have children, but a 19 pound Schnoodle (Schnauzer and poodle mix) with lots of fur.

 

[Gr8t Fan]

Our house was awfully chilly this morning too (Chicago) so I turned on the furnace. Of course the thermostat was only at 68 but it felt soooo COLD. I'm sure 61 feels even colder.

We have kids, the youngest of which is 2, so we usually keep the heat at 69 degrees and bump it up a degree or two when we're feeling chilly. I know our bills will be high, especially because it hasn't even started to get cold around here yet, but I refuse to be too chilly in my own house. We're on the budget plan, so we pay between $90-$130 a month depending on use.

No tips on how to keep the bill down, but I'll be watching this thread to see if there's anything I can use.

 

[CherylA]

We bought a pellet stove last year. After the initial, rather high, outlay it it much cheaper than heating with oil even with the prices having dropped on oil last winter. I don't even know what oil is going for this year. Did anyone lock in?

 

[NVDisMom]

We keep the thermostat at 55 and heat the living room with a space heater when needed. The living room and kitchen are the rooms where everyone hangs out, I see no reason to heat empty bedrooms. We are also very diligent about opening blinds to the sun during the day and closing them at night to keep the heat in. We have electric blankets on the beds with flannel sheets that are set on low. DH and I turn it off when we get into bed, but the girls leave theirs on all night. Maybe I should have them share a bed like in the old days. They'd kill me!
That cut our combined electric/natural gas bill in half last winter compared to the winter before. My family's only complaint is getting out of the shower is aweful cold. I might have to buy two small space heaters for the bathrooms. Turn it on when you get in the shower, turn it off when you get out.

 

[sherabby]

Yikes! We keep ours on 74 pretty much year round. We have central air. Right now I have it on 72 but when it starts to get really cold outside so does the house and up it goes to 74.

 

[ajk912]

We keep ours at 66 in the winter. That's a perfect temp for me, because I am bustling around and keeping busy. It's cold for my DH. So, he often starts a fire in the fireplace to warm up the living room. We just bought almost a cord of wood off of craigslist for $75, so hoping it lasts us most of the winter.

 

[BabyTigger99]

We keep our furnace at 62 while we are sleeping and when we are not home, and 65 if we are at home. We also have a gas fireplace we run in the family room.

This year I plan on putting plastic on our windows for the first time. My parents did last year, and they said it made a world of difference!

 

[wdwfan16]

68-70.

55 at night and I could have an extremely cold nose.

 

[DMickey28]

We just bought our first house in NH so I don't have any personal experience and we have lived in S. Florida the last three years so that doesn't help.

HOWEVER, my parents installed digital thermostats last year and they said it made a huge difference. They have three zones, one downstairs, and two upstairs. It's generally kept at 68 when people are home. My dad has a home office so he has a space heater in there.

With our new home we also have three zones, one in the main portion of the house, one in the add-on family room and one up stairs for the bedrooms. I plan on keeping the main part of the house at 68, the family room this winter since we don't have much to furnish it with yet at 64 and the upstairs at 65. We have a 2.5 year old and a baby on the way in March. I'll get the digital to drop the downstairs around 8pm and then fire it up again at 7AM and the opposite for the upstairs.

 

[boettj]

We use a programmable thermostat set to 68, when we are in the house. At night and during the day when we are not home, it's set to 64. When I work from home, I use a space heater in my office(our bedroom). In our family room, I burn two cords of wood each year. With a soapstone wood stove.


I recommend bringing in a technician to test the heat loss in your home. They will test for leaks and also check for proper insulation. After the test is complete, they will be able to tell you what your homes heat transfer rate is. Even new homes can lose heat quickly. This is due to a variety of reasons. It's mainly due to poor insulation.


Your local utility or supplier should be able to point you to local resources.


The following website, http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=heat_cool.pr_hvac will give you some tips.



Thank you

 

[tinkermom23]

We keep our thermostat at about 68 all winter. We wear sweatshirts and socks. If we're sitting around watching TV or playing a game, we put our slippers on. But usually we are busy moving around.

Last night Dh said we should probably turn on the furnace but I complained that it is only Sept. and we need to toughen up. Well, it was only 52 degrees in the house this morning! I did turn it on to get the chill out.

 

[IlliniMouse]

We are usually at 68-70, and we have an outdoor wood burner. Right now we're using the LP, but once it gets really cold out, we'll heat the house with wood for typically 4 months or until the wood runs out.

We just contracted our LP at $1.23. Last year it was around $1 more per gallon. So, heating costs should be down this winter...at least with LP!

 

[boettj]

I paid $2.05/gallon today for oil. Not too bad. Missed the sub $2 by a bit.

 

[sylvenmaid]

We have a natural gas heater. We live in South Louisiana so we are still using our A/C. Today feels much better and I think the a/c kicked once today. It will be in the mid 60's for lows the next couple of days. I'm going to open the house up and save money on the A/C. We also have ceiling fans which helps circulate the air. I have a feeling we are going to have a cold winter this year unlike the last few. I usually keep it around 65 both during the day and at night. I can't keep it too much colder at night b/c dh has a fit. I am planning on caulking all our windows and investing in some thermal lined curtains for the living room. This should help keep out the drafts. We also need to buy a couple of door draft stoppers. I figure we will spend around $250 but it should help keep our gas bills down. Our highest bill is usually around $120-150 for a couple of months. I'm really hoping our bills won't go over $100 this year.

 

[CherylA]

I paid $2.05/gallon today for oil. Not too bad. Missed the sub $2 by a bit.

We bought the pellet stove after a winter of paying over $4/gallon for oil. Now that we have it it was about $2.30/gallon last year and now lower this year! Oh well. Atleast the oil we have to use to supplement is lower and I just keep the house warmer in general. I like the feel of the pellet stove heat better than our forced hot air, oil heat. Plus the pellet stove gives off heat the is centralized to our living room where we spend most of our time. So before pellet stove we kept the heat at 68-69 degress. Now with the pellet stove it is usually 71-72 in our living room.

 

[daisyduck123]

72-74 all winter.

I refuse to be cold all winter. I like my house comfy.

 

[hrh_disney_queen]

Y'all are making me chilly! My rule is, if my nose or toes are cold, I need to bump up the thermostat. That is usually around 68 degrees. Luckily we don't need to do it for more than a couple of months, but in the summer the A/C is set at 77 and runs constantly. I actually opened the windows today to cool off instead of AC.

On a more pleasant note, today was the first day here that it felt like a season was about to change. It was down to about 75 and in the morning it was even a little cooler. I actually drove my car with the windows open instead of the A/C blasting. All I kept thinking was what a great time it would be to be at WDW!

We have electric heat pump/AC and our power bill is averaged at $217/month.

 

[Jennifer in MI]

We keep the thermostat at 55 and heat the living room with a space heater when needed. The living room and kitchen are the rooms where everyone hangs out, I see no reason to heat empty bedrooms. We are also very diligent about opening blinds to the sun during the day and closing them at night to keep the heat in. We have electric blankets on the beds with flannel sheets that are set on low. DH and I turn it off when we get into bed, but the girls leave theirs on all night. Maybe I should have them share a bed like in the old days. They'd kill me!
That cut our combined electric/natural gas bill in half last winter compared to the winter before. My family's only complaint is getting out of the shower is aweful cold. I might have to buy two small space heaters for the bathrooms. Turn it on when you get in the shower, turn it off when you get out.

Okay - I have questions for you. We, too, have an area of our house where we spend most of our day - kitchen/family room. We can close it off with doors. We usually keep our house at 62 during the winter during the day and 55 at night.

So, my question - we had a space heater in our last house that we used occasionally at night. It upped our bill something terrible! What kind of heater do you have? Our space heater was electric and our furnace was gas, so that may have had something to do with it!

And, about the sleeping arrangements - we usually end up with a child in our bed by the end of the night during the winter. And, this is from the older set - the 9, 11, and 13 yo!! The 3 yo is in bed with us anyway. And, the others end up in the same bed sometimes! I think it's cute.

None of my kids minds the colder temps. They know it's more travelling we can do if the bills are lower!!

Oh - we also have LOTS of blankets around the house for cold people to use.

 

[Disneyjamie]

So, my question - we had a space heater in our last house that we used occasionally at night. It upped our bill something terrible! What kind of heater do you have? Our space heater was electric and our furnace was gas, so that may have had something to do with it!

How terrible of a bill? I was thinking of doing what the OP said, 55 with electric space heater, thinking electricity is cheaper than gas in the winter.

 

[sharonmickey]

Glad to see I'm not the only one keeping my furnace down in the winter. My thermostat is set at 62 and it kicked on when I got home from work today. I'd love to keep it warmer but who can afford the gas bills? Unfortunately most days here are cloudy so the sun doesn't help heat.

I do have a gas fireplace in the living room that I use on really cold days, it generally causes the furnace to stay off.