Are you going to be away from your house for an amount of time and you're wondering I'm not going to be home I don't want to heat and cool a home while I'm not there and what should I leave my temperature at in this video, we're going to talk about some different scenarios I've read a bunch of things on the internet. there's articles and opinions and I'm going to give my opinion just like always. but unlike some I'm going to give you reasons why I feel the way I do about certain situations and so as we move through this video, the first thing is I'm going to break this down into what time of year it is, if it's summer versus winter and then also are we talking about long periods of time or are we just talking about for the day I Think that will help you understand different times of the year and what makes the most sense for you and your situation I Think that a lot of guys will make blanket statements on questions like this. they'll just say oh, your house should be this or that and they don't take into account.

First of all, every house is different and every part of the country is different. I Think some of the the thoughts that I'm going to put behind this will help with that. First things first, let's talk about summer. If you are going to be leaving your home and it's summertime, it gets real hot I Know certain parts of the country it can get really hot I'm in Virginia near the coast and it gets pretty warm.

We do see temperatures close to 100 but some of you guys down in Texas and other parts of the country we don't see the temperatures that you guys see. The main thing as I Was reading a few articles online that I want you to understand is I think that there is a temperature. Obviously that if your house gets above, say 100, 110 120 That there is structural problems that can happen to your home. However, I want to give you a few things to think about aside from that one being you have belongings in that house that may not react very well to temperatures above 100.

And so the temperature that I normally tell folks is no higher than 85. So if your thermostat is 85 in that space, there's other parts of your home that may be reaching even a little higher than that. Most of my customers when we set up their scheduling we actually go no higher than 80. Meaning, if it gets above 80, the AC will turn on and bring it back down to 80.

The other thing I'll mention if you're not going to be home as we go through this video is I Would hope that if you're not going to be there for long periods of time that you're going to have someone check on the house from time to time. Obviously, having cameras so you can monitor the house is always a good thing. Also, having say a Wi-Fi thermostat in some way that you can monitor or get even alerts if there's something wrong. that's always a good thing.

But again, I would say if you're not going to be at the house I would say 855 would be Max for the temperature that I would put my thermostat at. And so that's mostly if you're not going to be there for a while now. What about when you're not there during the day you're wondering. You know I'm going to work or for some other reason I'm not going to be home.

and what temperature should I set my thermostat at? This is not just the game of I'm not going to be home. So what's the absolute maximum I can set my temperature at I Think that there's also something to be said for you want to set it at a temperature that that air conditioner can now remove all that heat? Get all that heat out of your home at that point. And so that's why I Think that there shouldn't be blanket statements Because depending on what part of the country you're in, depending on the performance of your HVAC system, you may not be able to set your temp temperature as high as 80 and that system have enough time to economically make sense for you to just turn it off or or set that high temperature. So it is off during the day and it just sits there, sits there, sits there, and then all of a sudden you're expecting it to remove all that heat from the home cuz that's what it's doing.

It's removing the Heat and then cooling the air in the home and so that might be actually something you need to play with. You can try setting a you know, running a schedule at 75 degrees and making sure that it has enough time to kick on and bring that temperature down. Remove that heat from the home so it's comfortable by the time you get home. Now there are systems that have recovery and adaptive intelligence and all these different verbes.

But essentially what that system is doing is it's going to learn how long it takes for it to reach temperature. So if it takes an hour per se, it's going to turn on an hour before you get home and so that it can reach that temperature. But the point of me talking about all of this is there is a point right where it may not even make sense to do all this. We have customers that they found that when they're running a schedule that economically they use so much energy to get the heat out of that home at that point.

And we're going to talk more about this when we get to the wintertime scenarios. It just simply doesn't economically from a utility. Point electricity point for your utility bills For it to make sense for you to shut that system down for a period of time just to have it come back on and run full speed. There is an element of just set it and forget it, right? especially.

you know in these really hot days and it reaches these Peak temperatures and now you're expecting that system to turn on before you get home at 5:00 You're also putting a lot of wear and tear on that system, so especially if you have one of these newer inverter systems I Think just setting it and letting it run at a low speed and keep that house comfortable even when you're not going to be there. Maybe that might make more sense from an electricity standpoint, or maybe one's not better than the other anyway you. They just kind of break even there. So again, every house is different.

depending on what part of the country you're in might play a role in that and the type of heating and air system. how efficient it is might play a role in all this. You know it might just make sense to just set it and forget it. Let that efficient system do what it's going to do so again.

I would say 80 85 at the absolute Max I Never let my house go above 80, especially if I've got say nice furniture in there. if I've got pictures things like that, a lot of that stuff just does not respond well to high temperatures. And the other thing just to kind of mention it's not what this video is about, but you want to mention humidity as well. If you got all these belongings sitting in in your house and you live in a part of the country where humidity is something that you need to consider and now you're exposing those belongings of yours, furniture, and all these other personal items that will not respond well to high temperatures and high humidity.

and so that's something else I would consider if I were you. Let's talk real quick about winter if you're not going to be there for a long period of Time Versus a short period of time. if it's going to be a long period of time I Think that there is something to be said for understanding that just because your thermostat is in a location that is not below freezing, it doesn't mean other parts of your house are and what I mean by that is I've heard folks say well 32 is freezing so I'll just set my thermostat at 40 if they have a thermostat that can even go that low. So that way if it gets below 40, heat kicks on and now brings it back up to 40.

What they don't understand is the thermostat on the wall may be in at 40 30, but now you've got water lines and you've got other components in your house that are not getting the a little bit of warmth that that system is producing. When it gets that cold, you start to look at things like burst water lines and other issues because you're letting your house get that cold for us I used to do Property Management years ago and we would always say 60 degrees. We would tell residents if you're not going to be there for a while, do not turn your heat off. You need to at least leave it on and set it at 60.

So that way if that thermostat's at 60 other parts of the house that don't get the warm air blown into the common space and those water lines and so on, they are getting at least enough warmth to where they don't get that down to freezing temperatures. I Think that you might be able to push the envelope depending on what part of the country and depending on how well your house was built. If you don't have say water lines running in the exterior walls which most cases you shouldn't but there are scenarios where you you might be able to go lower than 60 and it still be okay unless you're winterizing that home, doing things like getting the water out of those water lines, putting antifreeze in your toilet, and doing all the things that guys do when they winterize homes. then I would say that 55 at the absolute lowest.

but I would say 60 is where I would leave my own home if I'm going to be gone for an extended amount of time Again, hopefully you have someone that's going to be periodically checking on that home. Shut off the water. If you're if nothing else, shut off the water to the house, set your heat right, have someone checking on the home periodically. Regardless, even if you're not going to actually fullon winterize the home.

I would still shut off the water to that house if I'm not going to be home for an extended amount of time. I do that when I go on vacation anyway. If I'm not going to be there, why would I just chance it? You shouldn't have a problem, but what if you do? What if the heat stops working right? and then the last thing the last scenario is in the winter time. if you're not going to be there for just a short amount of time, say you know just the day and you're looking at running a schedule.

I Do think that again. every house is different. Every scenario is different and it gets back to. does it make good economical sense for you to let that house get so cold? say 60 and now you're expecting to dump all this warm air in there.

Depending on the type of HVAC system you have, it just simply may not have the heat rise to reach that temperature in an economical way. And so I think if you want to run a schedule fine I Just think that you need to play with it a little bit if you want to say drop it down to say 66 when I'm not there during the day I Don't need to heat the home I'm not there. It warms the home back up before you get home so it's comfortable. That's something you can look at.

but I think in a lot of scenarios if you have an efficient system, especially an inverter system, I would probably say that if it's just short periods of time. In a lot of scenarios, I'm probably not even worried about all that. I might shut water off to my house just in case. but I'm not going to mess with the HV back system I'm going to let it do its thing I might lower the temperature a degree or two so it doesn't have to work quite as hard.

but I'm not going to make that system have to do all these amazing things trying to get the temperature back up before I get home. So I'm curious of all my rambling. What are your thoughts? What do you leave your temperature at? Do you run a schedule and have you ever had an issue with that? Love to hear about that down in the comments section, especially if you are leaving your home at long periods of time. What temperature do you like to leave it at and what part of The country in? Because when folks write articles online, they don't take into account someone in Arizona may be reading this article just like someone in Maine If you like this video I Think you'll like this one even more.

It's where. I Talk about how some of these newer inverter systems may not be the solution to some of your problems. Thanks for watching Hit that subscribe button. We'll see you next time.