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I save about 100 dollars each heating month. You can probably only do this if you are single. I set the thermostat to 57. I have an electric space heater that I run in whatever room I am in. I moved to the downstairs part of the house. The rooms are smaller, and easier to spot heat. I DO NOT run this space heater at night when asleep. I spend a lot of time in the smallest bedroom, which is now my office. I can easily heat this room to 70, or whatever I want. Is this as nice as the whole house being 70? No, but at least I can be comfortable in 1 room.
By the way, my electric bill does not change much. Since most of the house is cool, the refridge(my energy monster) hardly runs. This reduction in use goes to run the space heater, so my electric bill hardly changes. And electric rates here are cheap. I save about 500 a heating season(natural gas). I have been doing this for 3 years now.
You can get 10x that much for less than 3x the price from Ebay.
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Location: where the moss is taking over the villages
2,184 posts, read 5,550,483 times
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Today I installed (such a fancy word for such a simple task) weather stripping on the slider insert for the cat door upstairs. The room temp raised 2 degrees. Slowly but surely, I'll take everyone's advice!
I got the weatherizing KIT for windows. I'll do the downstairs first, since we now spend all our time in smaller rooms (easier to heat).
We didn't get the wall mounted heaters. They're a great idea but our rooms are small & the most important room, the bedroom, doesn't have good available wall space.
We decided to get Sunbeam convection space heaters (thermostat settings are 65-70-75-80-85 & it goes up to 72 degrees on the 65 degree setting but the unit is on the floor & the thermometer is about 4 feet up). I had one of these units on my side of the duplex (occupied by my daughter) & the electric bill was great (we're all electric, no gas). So Mr. Boyfriend got 2 of them at WalMart for $50/each.
My electric bill on my daughter's side (she doesn't have a clothes dryer & she doesn't use the dish washer) has been around 31 dollars.
this may seem dumb...but i would like some help.
my house is heated by duke energy..so i am guessing tat its electric. i keep my temp around 70 (in the evenings)since i dont like to be cold. i do dress warmly and wear socks. sometimes i increase the temp for a while till the house heats up and then reduce it to 65 when goin to sleep. my house is a single bed room around 900 sq ft, only me nad my hubby (who never feels the cold).we live in nc where the winters are not tat cold as else where.
will it help if i got a room heater and used tat during the night to warm my bedroom before i go to sleep ? right nw i pay around 45-50$ for heat, cooking,lights and laundry. is there any way i can reduce my bill. i cant reduce in cooking, since we cook almost everyday. laundry is around 1-2 times a month.
Location: where the moss is taking over the villages
2,184 posts, read 5,550,483 times
Reputation: 1270
Your bill is great - I wish I could complain about paying that low of a bill! ... I've learned to think of 60 degrees as very warm. Try lowering that thermostat more... Bundle up & wear about 2 layers of socks on your feet when not sleeping. Wear more than one layer for your top area at night... A cap or hat of some kind helps during the day.
I currently use a heating pad (60 watts & on the lowest setting) in the lower middle of the bed at night for our feet to touch on if we're getting cold. We have a wool blanket on top to hold in body heat.
We're using a space heater (Sunbeam convection with settings from 65-85 & an "eco" setting that helps conserve energy) all day & night. It's rated at 1500 watts but it doesn't use that all the time, due to the "eco" regulator.
70 degrees... I understand... When I lived in CA, I hated it when it would get down to 68 degrees indoors. 70 was my comfort zone. Now I love it if it's above 50 degrees!!!! 60 is HEAVENLY! 65 is unbelievable!
The bedroom got to 67 today with the heater on all day & night. Tropical. However, the bedroom door is kept open (prevents getting too dry also) to share the heat with the rest of the downstairs, perhaps under 500 square feet total. Bathroom, hall & two rooms (bed/office-entertainment).
this may seem dumb...but i would like some help.
my house is heated by duke energy..so i am guessing tat its electric. i keep my temp around 70 (in the evenings)since i dont like to be cold. i do dress warmly and wear socks. sometimes i increase the temp for a while till the house heats up and then reduce it to 65 when goin to sleep. my house is a single bed room around 900 sq ft, only me nad my hubby (who never feels the cold).we live in nc where the winters are not tat cold as else where.
will it help if i got a room heater and used tat during the night to warm my bedroom before i go to sleep ? right nw i pay around 45-50$ for heat, cooking,lights and laundry. is there any way i can reduce my bill. i cant reduce in cooking, since we cook almost everyday. laundry is around 1-2 times a month.
any suggestions ?
I live in NC too..so you're probably Duke Power?
Trust me, count your blessings..it does not get much lower than that. I pay $52 a month on their equal payment plan, and I'm pretty sure I'll get money back at the end of the month. $40 is about base for a one bedroom when you take into account appliances. Even when I lived in a place with gas heat, my electric was at least $45 a month.
this may seem dumb...but i would like some help.
my house is heated by duke energy..so i am guessing tat its electric. i keep my temp around 70 (in the evenings)since i dont like to be cold. i do dress warmly and wear socks. sometimes i increase the temp for a while till the house heats up and then reduce it to 65 when goin to sleep. my house is a single bed room around 900 sq ft, only me nad my hubby (who never feels the cold).we live in nc where the winters are not tat cold as else where.
will it help if i got a room heater and used tat during the night to warm my bedroom before i go to sleep ? right nw i pay around 45-50$ for heat, cooking,lights and laundry. is there any way i can reduce my bill. i cant reduce in cooking, since we cook almost everyday. laundry is around 1-2 times a month.
any suggestions ?
Just a suggestion, sorry, it is driving me nuts. "Tat" is spelled "that", with an "h". You misspelled it every time you wrote it so I assume it wasn't just a typo.
Now to answer your question:
If you're using electric heat do not turn your heat up and down. It will burn more electricity then keeping it set at a constant, higher setting. The reason is the heat strips on your heat pump will come on if you increase your temps inside more than one or two degrees at a time.
If you don't have a heat pump w/ electric strips disregard.
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