Homeowner Tips For Saving On Heating Costs During Fall and Winter

Here it comes. Summer is gone, and winter is on its way. And along with it comes higher energy costs to keep your home comfortable and warm. So, we have prepared these easy tips that you can do yourself help you improve your home’s energy efficiency and reduce your heating costs.

Adjust the Height of Your Outside Door Thresholds

Check your exterior door thresholds if there’s even a slight crack under any of your exterior doors, you’ll experience a significant cold draft. If you feel the cool air coming in through the bottom of your doors, you may need to raise the threshold to close the gap.

There are four screws, covered by plastic caps along the threshold at the bottom of the door. Remove the caps with a putty knife and tighten the screws (turning them clockwise) to raise the threshold until you get a tight seal across the entire threshold. To lower the threshold, turn the screws counterclockwise.

Keep Your Curtains Open

The sun can provide a great deal of warmth, even in the winter. By keeping your curtains and blinds open to allow the sunshine into your home, it will help to warm the air so that your furnace doesn’t have to work quite as hard.

Don’t Allow Heat to Escape Up Your Chimney

A fireplace can provide warmth and ambiance to a room. It can suck the heat out of the room by allowing warm air to escape up the chimney. You can minimize that effect by keeping the flue closed whenever the fireplace is not in use. Just be sure to remember to open it before you light your next fire.

Use Your Ceiling Fans

You’re probably aware that hot air rises and that’s why it’s often much cooler in the basement and the ground floor than it is on the floors above.

Using your ceiling fans on the reverse position (clockwise) during the winter will pull that warm air up to the ceiling and push it back down along the walls and help maintain a more even temperature throughout your house.

Regular Furnace Maintenance

This may be the single most important way to conserve energy through the winter. In the same way that getting your car tuned up regularly will make it more fuel-efficient, having your furnace maintained and inspected by an HVAC expert every fall will keep it running as energy efficiently as possible.

During the maintenance visit, a technician will inspect the furnace’s many components, perform diagnostic tests, and make any necessary minor adjustments that may be required. Often, these visits offer an opportunity to uncover a potential problem and address it immediately to avoid a future breakdown.

By completing these simple tasks, you will be keeping your energy bills in check and helping your furnace perform more efficiently and last longer. It’s a great way to ensure you have comfortable heat in your home throughout the winter. To book your next service or maintenance appointment with Superior Heating, Air Conditioning & Electrical, in Anoka, MN, call 763-422-1721.