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The reason I ask is because my neighbor mentioned to me that she sets it to only 74 degrees, making it sound as if she's saving energy by keeping it so high. We set ours at 78 degrees and it feels real comfortable especially if we have the ceiling fan on.... so my curious question is: what do you set yours to on these long hot Carolina days?
Hmm. . . perhaps I am not doing as well as I thought. Mine is set at 75, but I seem to be so hot-natured as a middle-aged woman -- and no, I am past the hot flashes and night sweats. I think I may bump it up some more. When I did set it at 78, I was hot (and that's with fans going to move the air) but yesterday when I went upstairs (we live in the downstairs), I was surprised it was comfortable, set at 80. Our house is newer, built in 2000, and very 'tight' and energy-efficient. The energy bills are surprisingly low, so much lower than they ever were down on the coast of NC.
82 during the workday when we are not at home. 78 in the morning and evenings. 76 at night when we sleep. We also have ceiling fans on in the bedrooms, family room, and kitchen.
It's funny because when I lived in Florida I always kept it at 78 and it was fine.
Here I feel like it's too hot at 78, and it's never above 75 - usually it's around 72 (I don't have a digital one here though so I'm not totally sure).
I think it's my lack of proximity to water. I'm less heat-tolerant!
I have a programmable thermostat and my neighbor doesn't. We have similar size houses and both are under 1 year old. My electric bill last month was about $50 cheaper than his. We keep our thermostats on about the same during the day, 73/74. The only difference I program my thermostat to raise the downstairs to 77 at night, when everyone is sleep, 11:00 pm to 8:00 a.m. and then have it revert back to 73. At night for my upstairs I have it drop to 72 at 9:00 pm to midnight to cool off our bedrooms for a few hours and then it drops to 73 from midnight to 7:00 am. at which point it goes back to 74 for the upstairs. So with all that said, my neighbor keeps his on consistently at 73 degrees, all day/night, and my bill was $50 cheaper.
I only have one thermostat and my house gets lots of sun so it is fun trying to manage the temperature upstairs and downstairs at the same time working off a single thermostat located on the ground floor. Here is what we do:
Summer Time:
We keep thermostat set at 77° to 78° and keep the HVAC fan set at auto and keep our ceiling fans running. This really helps circulate the cooler downstairs air to mix with our warmer upstairs air (upstairs windows get direct sun all day).
Winter Time:
We keep the thermostat at 64°to 68° and spend more of our time upstairs where it is about 7° warmer than it is downstairs!
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