Are You Paying Too Much to Heat Your Home? Read These 7 Mistakes You Could Be Making

Heating and cooling accounts for roughly 48 percent of all energy use in the average American home.

This means that during the colder months of the year, you can expect your energy bills to go up a bit due to your reliance on heat. However, your energy bills shouldn’t necessarily skyrocket.

If they do, it’s probably because you’re making a common heating mistake. The following are 7 common heating mistakes that can result in higher heating bills:

Woman looking at her electricity bill

1. Trying to heat the home quickly

For some reason, many homeowners will turn their thermostat all the way up, thinking that this will cause their home to heat up faster. However, your home will heat up at the exact same pace no matter what temperature you set it at.

This means that not only does your home not heat up faster the higher you set it, but you’ll just waste energy heating it up even more. And you’ll just have to read just the thermostat when it gets too hot in the house, which wastes even more energy.

2. Closing your vents

Some people will try to save energy by closing the vents in rooms that aren’t being used. This way they won’t be heated, right? Actually, this just causes your furnace to run less efficiently because it changes the air pressure in your entire system. You should never close more than 10 percent of your vents.

3. Using your fireplace

Using the fireplace is fun and it creates warmth in your home. But if you’re trying to save energy, avoid using it. When your fireplace flue is open, odds are more cold air will be sucked into your home than the amount of warm air that will be produced by the fire.

4. Relying on electric room heaters

You would think that heating one room at a time using electric room heaters would be more efficient than heating your entire home. But it’s not.

Electric room heaters use a lot of energy and a central gas heating system is typically cheaper and more efficient. Not to mention that an overreliance on electric room heaters can be a fire hazard.

5. Heating an empty house

If everyone that lives in your home leaves during the day, whether it’s for school or for work, then what’s the point in heating it? All you are doing is wasting energy.

However, it can be difficult to remember to turn the thermostat down before leaving everyday, and it’s uncomfortable returning to a cold house and waiting for it to heat up.

This is why you should install a programmable thermostat, which allows you to automatically set it to turn to different temperatures at different times of the day.

This means that you can have it automatically change to the most energy efficient setting when the last person leaves the house and have it turn the heat back on 15 minutes before you return so that the house is nice and warm when you get back.

6. Leaving your windows unlocked

Not only is it safer to lock your windows when they are closed, doing so creates a stronger seal that will keep cold air out and warm air in.

7. Leaving the curtains closed

Open the curtains during the day to allow as much heat from the sunlight in as possible. Close them at night to keep that heat trapped inside and to prevent cold air from seeping in.

Be sure to avoid making any of these 7 common heating mistakes in order to keep your heating bills as low as possible.

An Insulated Garage Door: The Secret to Saving Money

One of the biggest energy wasters is an inefficient garage door. If you’re heating your garage, it could be time for a more efficient door.

Garaga has sold over 1.7 million quality garage doors since 1983, and we can provide the right door for your needs. Browse through our variety of residential doors, or design your own online, and start saving money on your energy bill!

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