Smart Thermostat Facts

My husband and I both work full-time jobs that are demanding, stressful and involve long hours.

We have three boys who are all heavily involved in sports.

Between work, school, practices, games and tournaments, we spend a lot of time away from home. I used to try to remember to adjust the thermostat every time we left the house. I most often forgot. I then paid to either heat or cool empty rooms to the ideal temperature while we were gone. If I managed to raise or lower the thermostat to conserve energy, we then returned home to wither an overheated or freezing cold house. I finally looked into updating our thermostat. Modern smart thermostats include all sorts of really helpful operations. The thermostat connects to my phone, allowing me to make adjustments from virtually anywhere. Because of a feature called geofencing, I rarely need to mess with the temperature setting. The thermostat includes a GPS feature that tracks the whereabouts of our phones. It knows when we enter or leave a perimeter around the house and reacts accordingly. The thermostat automatically adjusts to use less energy when the residence is empty and makes sure to welcome us home to ideal comfort. I like that I get reminders when it’s time to change air filters or schedule professional maintenance. I now take way better care of the furnace and air conditioner and spend a lot less on monthly energy bills. Although the thermostat came with a $200 price tag, it has nearly paid for itself in a year. It’s one of the best home improvements I’ve ever made.

 

air duct

When I first heard about a dual fuel system, I assumed the HVAC contractor was just hoping for a hefty profit.

• This type of system combines a forced air gas furnace and an electric heat pump.

The combined cost of purchase and installation is downright huge. However, I already had the furnace in place when I bought my new house. I was looking to add some type of centralized cooling system. The HVAC contractor recommended I choose an electric heat pump. I looked into heat pumps and discovered that they are more expensive than a conventional air conditioner. However, this innovative style of system offers a long list of benefits that make the investment worthwhile. For one thing, a heat pump provides both heating and cooling capacity. It can operate just like an air conditioner in the summer but reverse operation to provide heat when the weather turns colder. A heat pump is especially effective at combating excess humidity, making it an efficient and rewarding choice for summer comfort. For heating, the system pulls ambient heat from the outdoor air and pumps it indoors. There’s no combustion process, fumes, greenhouse gases or threat of carbon monoxide. By avoiding the burning of fossil fuels, the heat pump is environmentally responsible and especially safe. It’s also extremely energy efficient. It costs far less to operate than the furnace. Running the heat pump instead of the furnace saves a significant amount on heating bills. Once the outdoor temperature drops below freezing, there isn’t enough ambient heat available for the heat pump to be effective. The furnace automatically takes over at this point. The duel fuel system takes advantage of the most cost-effective source of temperature control at any given time.
Air conditioner service

I learned recently that you sometimes pay a heavy price for being cheap with home maintenance. For some reason I thought caulking a bathroom shower would be a waste of money. But a $8 tube of caulk can prevent the walls underneath your shower tiles from rotting and creating mold in the bathroom. I learned the hard way that once you allow this problem to start, you’re wasting money on heavy bleach cleaning chemicals to eradicate the mold every time it returns. But if you can seal the area for good, there isn’t any mold to worry about. When I’m changing my oil in my old car, it’s worth it to me to spend a tiny bit more money to get high mileage oil or full synthetic. If it keeps the engine in my car running longer, then it’s worth the small added expense each time. Unfortunately, I had to learn this rough lesson with the filters in my central air conditioner. HVAC filters aren’t cheap, with some costing upwards to $20 a piece if you get viral and bacterial rated filters. I didn’t see the reason for spending $15 a month on expensive filters, so I went with something cheap instead. It took me a few months to realize that my allergies were out of control. But I didn’t make the connection to the air filters until my doctor asked me which kind I was using. When I told him about the cheap filters, he urged me to buy an allergen filter. For $13 a month, I could have unrestricted air waves and sinuses that aren’t terribly congested. After making the change, my allergies immediately started to abate. I think my health is worth the extra money each month on HVAC filters.

 

Click to read more

My wife always wanted to be a painter.

• She started taking pottery and sculpting classes with her mother at six years old.

Once she showed a natural proficiency for both, her parents started buying her all sorts of different art kits for birthdays and holidays. By the time she started taking art classes in middle school, she had gravitated towards drawing and painting. She has told me countless stories about the hours she spent using watercolors before she graduated to oil paints and pastels. When she started high school, she entered her first art competition. It was for teenagers ages 14 to 17, and among hundreds of participants from her home town, she placed third overall in the painting category. Unfortunately when it came time to apply to college, she didn’t have the money or scholarships to attend art school. Plus, the prospect of being a professional painter with enough money to survive seemed like a pipe dream to her at the time. Nowadays she works in banking but she hasn’t given up her love for art. I am going to make our garage climate controlled with an air conditioner and a heating system so she can work out there regardless of the weather outside. Having a conditioned garage is a good investment too, something I assume will add to our equity. But the goal is to make my wife happy, regardless of how much I spend on heating and cooling equipment. I think a ductless mini split would be a perfect choice for the garage. They take up relatively little space indoors and they’re more powerful than most window air conditioners.
Heating service

I spent a lot of time in college at the library, sometimes in the early morning hours and other times late at night.

The residence halls were extremely noisy and the walls for my dorm were paper thin.

Even during the week students were partying and drinking loudly. Hearing music blaring through my walls or windows was a normal thing regardless of the time of the day or the day of the week. Since the library was significantly far from the residence halls, it was easy to find solace there in the comfort and silence. They had plenty of chairs and couches with small tables for students to use, especially if you had a laptop with you and needed a place to work with a power outlet in reach. Since I was studying philosophy, I liked to sit in the chairs near the philosophy section upstairs. If I ever needed a book for a paper I was writing, it was a short walk to find what I needed. By and far one of my favorite aspects about working in the library was the stellar heating and cooling system. It seemed like no matter what the weather was like outside, I was never comfortable in my dorm room. If it was warm outside, the air conditioner was never cold enough. If it was winter outside, the heater wasn’t strong enough. But in the library, I was always comfortable. Sometimes the a/c was a little strong, but a sweater is an easy solution to that problem. I think I miss working in the library all of those years ago, as things were more simple in those days.
heating provider

It’s nice having a close friend who’s so good with air conditioners and furnaces

I have a friend from high school who has had a really tough life. His biological mother was committed to a state mental hospital when he was a child and his father was physically and emotionally abusive to him as he grew up. He wasn’t exactly encouraged to do well in school, nor did he have support at home whenever he needed help on homework. But despite this, he was a devoted and motivated kid with his hobbies. Despite his father’s problems, he was a painter by trade and taught my friend a lot about visual art. My friend loved sculpting with clay in particular, because he loved using his hands to morph something new out of nothing. He also took a liking to tools and handyman work, another thing his father taught him over the years. When I was headed to college, my friend took a different route and decided to go to trade school. He wasn’t sure at first where he would end up at the program, but eventually he fell into heating and cooling. It’s a lucrative business especially in our warm climate. He can utilize his hands all day long while he works, but he doesn’t have to worry about job security like his father does with his painting work. It’s nice having a close friend who’s so good with air conditioners and furnaces. He offered to help me install a window air conditioner in one of my apartments and I was incredibly grateful for his assistance. Aside from giving him beer, I also like to cook for him in exchange for his services. I might not be handy enough to work on the HVAC system, but I know my way around the kitchen at least.

 

 

Cooling

I wanted to go fishing and canoeing with my friends last weekend, but I had to cancel at the last minute.

My friends and I went to the store and we picked out all of our supplies for the weekend.

We had plenty of beer, chips, pretzels, and sandwich meat. We didn’t plan to cook a lot so we brought plenty of food that we could stick in the cooler. We even brought a cooler just for the water, soda, and beer. We made reservations at the state park and we got two campsites next to each other. We planned to have a party all weekend. Tuesday morning, my boss brought me into the office and we discussed an opportunity. The boss wanted to give me a raise and a promotion. I’ve been employed by this particular HVAC repair company for the past six years. My boss has been promising me a raise and a promotion for the last year. I want to run the HVAC business one day in the future. I was really excited when I heard about the offer. I listened very carefully as the boss explained the details. I like the perks like dental and health benefits and 35% off all HVAC services in my home. Unfortunately, the promotion means I have to work every weekend for the next six months. I have to learn how to run the business. I had to start last weekend and my friends were pretty aggravated and mad that I missed our weekend of camping. I still paid for my share of the fees, but I didn’t get to enjoy any of the fun activities.

Business

My wife and I were extremely concerned about the indoor air quality in our home, especially after our son was exposed to the coronavirus at school.

We were so worried about getting sick and none of us were being careful.

My wife suggested that we buy an indoor air cleaner for the property. I didn’t really want to spend the money on the machine, but I knew it was the best way to protect our family and clean the indoor air. We bought an indoor air cleaner that removes many different types of allergens and contaminants like smoke, dust, ragweed, dander, and pollen. The air cleaner also removes virus and bacteria germs. My wife and I were excited and anxious to receive our air cleaner, so we ordered express shipping on the product. Two days later, our indoor air cleaner arrived through the UPS delivery service. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the indoor air cleaner that my wife and I ordered. Instead, the product delivery service sent us an air conditioner. It was hard to understand how they screwed up the order and sent the wrong product, but my wife and I were very patient with the person on the phone. We spent 15 or 20 minutes on the phone with the customer service person. The lady was apologetic and very kind. She certainly didn’t understand how the mistake occurred either. She even refunded our original shipping fees since the item didn’t arrive on time. The next item was also shipped express but free of charge. Our air cleaner finally arrived seven days after we ordered the item online.

 

oil furnace

My wife and I were looking at a couple of different houses for sale in the valley.

Both of us wanted to move to the country, but we absolutely wanted to find the right house.

We knew that we would spend a fortune on the house and we wanted to get the right place to spend the rest of our life. My wife and I had a list of amenities that we wanted in our home like a garden tub, fireplace, and large backyard. The two of us weren’t going to settle for anything that did not meet all of our requirements. We looked at a lot of different houses before we found a place that was almost perfect. The owner of the house told both of us that the ductwork had some issues that needed to be fixed. I decided it would be worth our while to call an HVAC contractor to review all of the HVAC components. I had to spend $300 to find a reputable and certified HVAC contractor to complete the work. After I found the right contractor to complete the work, I made an appointment with the owner of the property. The HVAC contractor both of us at the address so we could check on all of the heating and air conditioning equipment. The contractor spent about an hour looking at everything and then he provided me a list of problems. The holes in the ductwork were just the beginning of the HVAC issues. The contractor gave us a lot to think about before we moved forward with the purchase.

furnace/heater service

Mold has always been an issue in my lake house.

I always thought it was part of living in the southern region.

After all, 280 days every year are filled with heat and humidity. It’s not uncommon for the summer temperatures to reach 100 degrees. It’s not uncommon for the air conditioner to run all day and all night. It’s certainly not uncommon to have issues with mold. In fact, mold is an issue for a lot of people that live in this region. Until recently, I didn’t know how to combat the issue. I was using vinegar water to kill the mold spores and stop the spread. I had a free indoor air quality check performed in my lake house last week and I found out that humidity is a serious problem. The HVAC company representative suggested buying a dehumidifier for my home. At first I thought the guy was trying to sell me an expensive piece of equipment, but after researching dehumidifiers, I think I might buy a machine for the house. A dehumidifier can remove all of the excess moisture from the air. If I buy a dehumidifier with an air purifier, it will also kill all of the viruses and bacteria in the air. Since the indoor air quality check was absolutely free, I thanked the HVAC company representative for his time and his opinion. I needed more time to process my choices. Now that I have researched the options thoroughly, I think it is time to start searching for a dehumidifier. I know it won’t be easy to find something cheap, but I have to stay within the budget.

HEPA filter