5 Simple Steps That Will Help Protect Your Home From the Cold
As the mercury begins dropping, and winter approaches, many homeowners wonder how they can best protect their home from the cold. After all, cold winters can affect everything from your energy bills to your general comfort if your home isn’t properly prepared to keep out the elements.
Many assume that they’ll need to undergo radical and expensive renovation projects to protect their home from the elements, such as repairing broken or chipped bricks (since even a cracked brick can let cold air in) or undergoing major roofing renovations to help keep your heat from escaping through the roof.
And while these larger projects are definitely needed for some homeowners—you should definitely undergo larger projects if necessary—there are other simple ways you can protect your home from the cold (and in many cases, protect your wallet from energy bills).
Install a Smart Thermostat
More and more homes entrust a smart thermostat to maintain the temperature of their home, regulating their furnace and air conditioning when needed. And it’s no surprise why! Smart thermostats are convenient, reliable, and less expensive to install than you might assume.
Not only do they give you the freedom of controlling your home’s temperature from your phone, it tracks your overall energy usage, and uses your energy more efficiently so as to save money. You can create a “heat schedule” that keeps your home comfortable while you’re there, while using less heat and energy when you’re away.
If your home doesn’t already have a smart thermostat, you’re definitely missing out. And it might be worthwhile looking into the following possible choices.
Nest
The Nest thermostat, made by Google, is no doubt the market leader. It’s relatively simple to install and has some great features, like the ability to schedule your temperatures over the course of any given week, and tracking when you’re home or away through their app.
Plus, if you have Alexa, you can pair it with your Nest, for even more control over your settings. It’s the most popular smart thermostat for a reason.
Ecobee3
The Ecobee3 Light Smart Thermostat has a lot of the benefits of the Nest, with a few key additions. It has a SmartSensor that can be added to it, which helps identify (and address) hot and cold spots within your home. And it not only monitors your temperature, but also your humidity and provides a five day forecast.
It might not be as common as the Nest, but it is still a powerful, and useful, tool that can help make your home stay warm without breaking the bank when the energy bill comes due.
Amazon
Amazon has their own smart thermostat too, and it also has its proponents. The Amazon Smart Thermostat, like the other two listed above, is Energy Star certified, meaning it promises to save you at least $50 a year in energy bills.
It has fewer bells and whistles than the Nest or Ecobee3, but is also the cheapest option of the three, while still providing a lot of the benefits of the other two systems.
Of course, there are other ways to keep your home warm and protected this winter that don’t even involve buying any fancy tech. For example, a simple way to protect your home this winter involves simply…
Keeping Your Gutters Clean
Before winter arrives, it’s essential to make sure your gutters are clean. Fall is the perfect time to either hire a service, or grab a ladder and do it yourself, to make sure your gutters are free from debris, leaves and dirt. You can clean your gutters at any point, but it’s imperative you make sure your gutters are regularly cleaned, especially before any heavy snow comes your way.
Having clean gutters will save you a lot of hassle and potential damage to your home. When clean, your gutters properly drain both rain water and melting snow and ice. But if they’re dirty or clogged, you’ll get ice build-ups, and water flows, that will back up your gutter system and potentially cause water damage to your phone.
During the fall, your gutters will collect tree branches and other debris that can accumulate over the month and potentially clog your gutters. So it’s essential to check on those gutters, and clean them when necessary.
You can always hire a professional to take care of this, but (as long as you take proper safety precautions) anyone can safely and easily clean their own gutters. If you’re not sure you’re up to it, check out this handy gutter cleaning guide and decide for yourself.
Maintain a 50 Degree Temperature (at Least) at All Times
There are two primary areas where you can protect your home from the cold. If you're talking about winterization, the focus is on either defending your home from physical damage (which can be done by cleaning your gutters regularly, for example) or saving energy wherever possible, and as a result, saving money on your heating bills (which the smart thermostat can help you with).
So it might be surprising to find out that the idea of letting temperatures drop by turning off your heat entirely while you’re not home is actually not the best way to protect your home from the cold.
Yes, even if it means turning on your furnace when you’re gone for days or weeks at a time, it’s critical that you maintain at least a 50 degree temperature at all times.
First of all, keeping a consistent temperature requires less energy than the seesaw of dropping temperatures, raising them back up, and then letting them drop again.
That might appear to make sense, but, believe it or not, it could also cost you more. Keeping a consistent temperature requires less energy than letting the temperature drop to low levels, and then reheating to a comfortable temperature once again.
But even more importantly—if you let your home or apartment become too cold, the pipes can freeze, which then burst and cause disastrous water damage to your home.
Run Your Ceiling Fan in Reverse
Another simple and easy trick to better utilize your home’s heating system is to run the ceiling fan, in the reverse setting. This might seem strange, but hear us out.
While you often use your fan as something to keep you cool in the summer, when you reverse the setting, it sucks air up, instead of pushing air down. Considering that warm air rises, while cool air falls, by setting a ceiling fan on the reverse setting, you are effectively pushing warmer air down toward the ground, making your home feel warmer and requiring less energy to heat it up.
This is called an updraft, and the amount of energy you’ll save by running the fan is much more than the small amount of energy required to run the fan. So feel free to use your ceiling fan year-round (just so long as you remember to use the right setting for the right season).
Run Your Water Constantly On Especially Cold Days
We alluded to this in our advice to maintain a minimum temperature for your thermostat, but we can’t stress enough that one of the most important disasters to protect your home from in the winter is to avoid broken pipes. Every year, over 250,000 homes suffer broken pipes due to cold weather, causing tens millions of dollars in damage. But that’s so easily preventable!
Whenever especially cold weather is in the forecast, make sure to trickle water (from both hot and cold taps) in every faucet and sink in your home. This keeps the water moving, which makes it harder for it to settle, freeze, and ultimately cause your water pipes to burst.
Of course, there are other tactics you can follow to ensure your pipes don’t freeze, such as—
Opening Cabinets in Your Kitchen and Bathroom
If there’s a room where pipes are contained, like under your sinks in your kitchen and bathroom, open those cabinets, especially if you are planning on being away for a few days. This will help circulate the warmer air in your home around those pipes, which further helps prevent pipes from freezing.
Insulate Your Pipes
If you want to be especially cautious, you can buy insulation and wrap it around any exposed pipes you can find in your home. This is not necessary for most homes, but for peace of mind it’s a great and relatively easy, inexpensive way to prevent costly damage.
Keep That Thermostat Running
We mentioned it before, but it bears mentioning again—if you make sure your home never gets to a below-freezing level, you very likely won’t have to worry about your pipes freezing on you. And trust us, not having to worry about broken pipes is well worth it.
Conclusion:
While there are plenty of ways to protect your home from the cold weather, these are just a few that you can tackle right now. But if there are larger issues in your home that could be negatively affected by cold weather, be it related to plumbing, your HVAC systems, or window replacement, Billy has the pros that will help make your home a Winter Wonderland. Make sure to check out the dozens of services they provide at https://www.billy.com/pro-services
About Author:
Jeff Good is a Chicago-based writer who loves delving deep into topics related to home renovation, and, depending on the year, rooting for the Chicago Cubs.
