JFF - What temperature do you keep your home at?

[Friday]

I have a certain reputation for being a lizard... I looooooooove the heat. I also love/heart/adore & bliss out in the snow (0 down to apx -20F -30C), but to be frank? At least half of that is that I’m WARM in snow clothes! ;)

We have 4 generations at my parents home, at the moment, and my parents keep their house mostly in the 60’s (there are a few areas that are colder, but they stationed their thermostats by the heat vents, so nowhere is warmer). Their stated reason (that I used to believe) about why, is that it’s a huge house & heating it is expensive. I get that. I’ve lived in places I have to cordon off certain areas to heat, because there’s no way I even could heat the whole thing, much less afford to. Except? When I offered to pay the difference they flat out refused; AND that when my brother visits them? They turn the heat up to 72F / 22C and are walking around in summer clothes, sweating, fanning themselves, bitching, and moaning. So it’s not the cost. They just like the cold. Which is fine. It’s their house. They can keep the temp where they want it. (I just wish they’d be honest about it!)

..So a few of us, not the whole tribe / just 2 of my siblings, had a wee chat...

- My parents (as mentioned above) keep theirs in the low 60’s / 16-18C
- My sister keeps her house in the low 70s / 20-23C
- My brother keeps his house in the mid 70s / 24-25C
- I keep my house at roughly 80F / 27C.
^^^ I’m comfy-happy-relaxed indoors 10 degrees in either direction

Weirdly, enough? My average heating cost is much lower than either of theirs (my bro is going to fly me to his, to “Friday-ize” his house once “the Covid” is over... if he doesn’t end up with time off work before then)... becuase 1) I insulate the hell out of every house I own/rent & 2) I reeeeeally enjoy chopping wood. It’s phenom exercise, and smells great. So I supplement my piped-in heating (gas, oil, or electric) with at least 1 fireplace & if I’m reeeeeeally lucky??? A wood burning stove. If I ever build a house, it’s going to have a Korean style Ondol ... which is a combo wood burning stove & underfloor heating system, so none of your stove/fireplace heat is wasted.

Spoiler: Ondol Image

Anyhow, our discussion (and because I just recently climate-hopped for a week somewhere dry & cold, instead of wet & cold) made me wonder how all y’all heat/cool your homes?

 

[intothelight]

I keep it around 70 and LOVE a wood burning stove.

 

[ladee]

I keep it in the low 70's. Around 72F in the summer and rarely above 74F in the winter. What little bit of winter we get here. I used to love summer and the heat. Lived on the coast in Texas and was always in the water somewhere.

As I've gotten older, I can not tolerate the heat anymore. Our summers are brutal at 110 to 115 F. I have Fibro so have to keep my body warm but have to have air circulating or I feel like I can't breathe.

One house I lived in had a wood-burning stove for heat. I loved it. And done right, it can heat a whole two-bedroom house without it being chilly or so hot you have to open windows. I loved going out in the woods and finding 'lighter pine'. Loved that pure turpentine smell and how good the house smelled when it started to burn. It can make a fire very hot so don't need much. And I chopped a lot of wood back in the day.

But nope, I have to have it cooler. I'm fat and OLD!! And glad I live alone.

 

[Mee]

U.K. government has guidelines - though I cannot remember what they are .

we mainly don’t heat a lot because of money too, but also environment . If we are relying on our heating ( air source heat pump ) the out put is set to 17 degrees Celsius downstairs ) warm enough when active or when warmly dressed) for me - like right now? I am on a sofa under three blankets . Upstairs , it’s warmer in the barhroom and most of the time off in our bedroom . But we have an electric blanket - the bed is warm, not hot and the air cold - this combination seems to be how I sleep best - temperature regulation for sleeping is really important .

We also have a wood burner which we use instead of the cooker when it’s on and do not have the air source on at the same time. That heats the house MUCH warmer. I love that I admit . it’s also a nicer kind of heat somehow .

I would prefer to be warmer , but I don’t NEED to be unless I have a cold or something. If my joints are very bad we put the heating up a couple of degrees , I wear more clothes or I spend more time in the kitchen with the wood burner .

 

[scout86]

What temperature it is inside depends on the season and whether or not I have company. (Which doesn't happen very often.) In the winter, it's in the low 60's when I'm home during the day. Mid 50's at night. In the summer, it's the same as it is outside, unless It's really hot and humid outside, and there's no breeze. If I have to use the AC, upper 70's during the day, 70ish at night. (Honestly that's too warm to sleep comfortably, but I'm too cheap to have it cooler than that.) But, the house is insulated pretty well, I put plastic over the windows in the winter, and it doesn't cost a whole lot to heat or cool.

 

[nursenurse]

My aircon is on all winter in my condo, western exposure, full wall of windows, surrounded by the blue rinse set, and in spite of sun shades pulled down, the temp goes up to almost 90 F in the winter, even if there is snow on the the ground. So, 20C/ 68F, sometimes I will switch to 18C. Sweatshirts all around for visiting frozen onions.

 

[RussellSue]

For the 11 years that I lived in my 3 bedroom, I mostly kept the thermostat at 55 degrees. That was because of money. Eventually, I put in a woodstove nearly the size of a small sedan and then it was noticeably warmer and the cost wasn't bad.

In Portland, we had no heat bill and no thermostat but our thermometer said it hovered between 70 and 72 in there. We also had no heat bill in Santa Fe and we kept it about the same temperature. So, I think 70 is my ideal thermostat temp, all other factors, aside. <<---- This, right here is the only information in this response that is actually relevant to this thread. The rest is my mind wandering.

Living in an RV is hard on heating costs. We are zone heating with space heaters and keeping the one nearest our primary living space around 65 degrees. We only have 400 square feet but it was built with 2x2s and we don't have any skirting, yet. I went so far as to order heated socks because the floor is plain brutal and it doesn't matter if it is 70 degrees inside -- if it is 20 degrees outside, the floor makes your toes huddle together for warmth. They won't have to worry about me refusing a bedside urinal in a few years -- I am already being convinced. But it's gonna get a lot colder.

We had a woodstove in our last park model which may or may not have been perfectly legal but because RVs aren't a concern of the building department, the DMV doesn't inspect wood stoves and since we were in a very rural area where no one really went out of their way to inspect anything, anyway, we decided not to concern ourselves with all that. We survived a couple of nights of -40F and a week where we never broke freezing with that (and skirting). At that point, I was fond of letting it get above 85 inside before I would stop stuffing the stove with wood. But again, 2x2 walls and RV floors are damned cold when it's below freezing -- it doesn't matter what the thermometer on the table says.

2) I reeeeeally enjoy chopping wood.

My mom does too (she's 64) and it makes me jealous. I couldn't chop a log to save my life. I have REALLY, REALLY tried.

 

[Teasel]

My heating isn't on a thermostat so I've no idea what temp it is inside. I like tings colder than pretty much anyone though. Its gotten worse as I've gotten older.

 

[Friday]

<grin> These are all so fun. I love it.

 

[Rumors]

67/68 perfect sleeping temp

 

[MrMoonlight]

When I sleep I like it colder, during the day my preference is 72 degrees. Right now we are having a little cold snap, the high was something like 65 ... feels so good to open the window and bring in cool air. A luxury I've not enjoyed for months.

But yeah, 70-72 inside right now feels nice with all sorts of fans moving air. Something I lace my living areas with, particularly at night, I've just got to have a fan moving air ... feel moving fresh cool air on skin. Tonight I'll open my window ... with a low expected to be around 45 ... my room will feel nice under blankets and fans.

 

[user27357]

the heat pump is set at 68, but the woodstoves get use when the temps drop below 40 outside. Yep, I am a wood scrounge and have a woodshed with fir and hardwood mixed about fifty fifty, 4 maybe 5 cords a year, probably more this year because there will be someone here to feed it full time.
If I build another house, I might do an outdoor woodstove, basically a wood fired boiler that sends hot water to all sorts of heat exchangers. I know someone that augments his heat pump, his water heater, his hot tub, even the air supply to his dryer with scratch built heat exchangers fed hot water by a solar powered pump. He's a farmer so winters are pretty much free time to tinker. I don't know what his thermostat is set at. Anywhere he wants it.
My wife and I joke that our temp preferences coincided for maybe a week or two in 1998. She has steadily wanted it cooler I have steadily wanted warmer. I rode motorcycles year round on the 45th parallel as a young man, cold was definitely part of my life. She couldn't bear a volkswagon heater system and it's tendencies to warm windshields before operators and barely that when she was young. She had to have water cooled and passenger heated cars. Heated seats as soon as they were invented. Now she drives around with the windows down making me crazy, and I have to be reminded to turn the defrost fan high setting down 20 minutes into a trip.