Most homeowners face many challenges for keeping their homes comfortable — air leaks, uneven airflow and more. If you like to save energy, it’s even more difficult to maintain maximum home comfort without racking up high energy bills. If this sounds familiar, keep reading to learn important comfort tips that save energy, too.
Seal Up Your Home
It’s a never-ending struggle to keep a leaky house comfortable. On top of that, air leaks around windows, doors, attached garages and the attic hatch and floor substantially increase your energy costs. Fortunately, sealing air leaks is fairly simple and a great investment considering the low costs of caulk and weatherstripping.
Maintain Free Airflow
Stuffy rooms and cold spots are indicators of poor airflow through your home. Additionally, poor airflow may be a burden on your HVAC system. Implement these tips into your home comfort and efficiency program:
- Keep interior doors open — even for unoccupied rooms.
- Check your HVAC air filter and change as recommended by the manufacturer.
- Make sure air vents and returns are unobstructed and clean.
- Schedule a ductwork inspection with your HVAC pro.
Attic Insulation
Have you looked in your attic lately? Check to make sure you have enough attic insulation installed. If you use fiberglass rolls, there should be about one foot or more of insulation. Call your HVAC pro if you have questions.
Window Coverings
Windows are the Achilles heel in your home’s envelope. Even with high-efficiency glass, your windows allow more heat gain/loss than your walls and insulation. Window coverings can help maintain optimal comfort, whether curtains, shades, blinds and/or shutters.
Smart Thermostats
If you are using a basic digital or manual thermostat, swap it out for a programmable model or a smart thermostat. Programming temperature changes for your heating and cooling systems keeps your home comfortable when you need it, and saves money when you are away or during sleep hours.
Regardless of your comfort setting, if you program your thermostat up/back 3/5 degrees during sleep/work hours, you should be satisfied with energy savings and delighted with your comfort.
For more home comfort tips, check out more Jackson and Sons Heating and Air home comfort blogs.
Jackson & Sons, Inc.
Our goal is to help educate our customers in Eastern North Carolina (including Wayne, Johnston, Greene, Lenoir, Pitt and Duplin Counties) about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems).
Credit/Copyright Attribution: “Pexels_Bruce Mars”
