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There is a cheaper alternative called an automatic thermostat. We used it in our previous and current home. It’s effective at lowering your energy bill and keeping you comfortable for those in between months. These are the months in which the AC is on when you go to bed but wake up to a freezing cold house. You set the AC to one temperature and you set the heat to another temperature with no less than 3 degrees separating the two numbers. For example if you set the heat to 68 then the lowest AC temp you can set is 71. It’s also good for if you left home with the heater running and forgot to switch back to AC and come home to a hot house. With this thermostat if the temperature goes one degree beyond the heat or cool set point then the thermostat will automatically switch to maintain that set point. Instead of waking to a house nearly in the 50s you wake to a house at the temperature you set your heater for. Instead of coming home to a hot house your house is at the temperature you set your AC for. The wider the difference between heat and cool setting the less frequent your unit will run.
Typical those that switch back and forth between heat and cool, require at least a 3-4 degree different temperature setting otherwise they end up cycling to much. I do not use mine for this reason. I run my heat at 76 and my cool at 78. I like it warm.
My thermostat has a setting where I can choose the high and low temps. If it gets too high, the ac kicks in. Too low sets off the heat. I keep the high setting at 77 and the low at 68.
The thing that turned me away from installing a smart thermostat wasn't the price of the item, it was the installation. Per my relatives in the HVAC business, a smart thermostat requires one more wire to provide power to it than my old/ordinary thermostat uses. I would have had to find an electrician to wire it up for me, as I wasn't confident in my own ability to find/route a hot wire to provide power - some things are best left to someone who knows what he/she is doing.
I'll get a smart thermostat...eventually. Probably after everything else is taken care of. Until then, I just set it to 72°F and Cool in the summer and 68°F and Heat in the winter and live with what I have.
The thing that turned me away from installing a smart thermostat wasn't the price of the item, it was the installation. Per my relatives in the HVAC business, a smart thermostat requires one more wire to provide power to it than my old/ordinary thermostat uses. I would have had to find an electrician to wire it up for me, as I wasn't confident in my own ability to find/route a hot wire to provide power - some things are best left to someone who knows what he/she is doing.
I'll get a smart thermostat...eventually. Probably after everything else is taken care of. Until then, I just set it to 72°F and Cool in the summer and 68°F and Heat in the winter and live with what I have.
We ended up with a touch screen programmable thermostat when we purchased a completely new HVAC system for the home. It has more features than we’ll ever use. I work rotating shifts at the hospital and wife stays home all day so a day to day schedule is a waste of time for us. The fan is variable speed so when the AC and heat aren’t on we can set the unit to either run the fan constantly at low speed or have the fan cycle on and off on a time schedule between AC/HEAT cycles to circulate the air for several minutes.
I don't even use my programmable thermostats that much right now. One is a pain to program, the other stays at a pretty consistant temp, so I really don't need to use it, just set it down a few degrees in the evening.
Note that these utility rebates come with the agreement that the utility can control your thermostat during certain times. Not everyone is comfortable with that.
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