Warm Your Home This Winter

We spend way more time indoors during the cold and dark months of the winter time, which means that the heating bill that you have is about to go up. Nobody wants to have to spend more than necessary, and the cost of living is already becoming slightly unbearable, depending on the income of the household that it’s pertaining to. Ideally, you should be able to maintain your warmth through the winter months without having to be too far out of pocket, but that’s not always the case.

Fortunately, while we can’t control what companies are charging for people to live comfortably inside their homes, we can control just how much we are looking after our homes to keep it warm. For example, if you are investing in furnace repair, you might find that your house is more comfortable for longer because you are keeping up with the maintenance of one of the hardest items in the home. That being said, let’s talk about some of the ways that you can warm your home this winter that won’t leave you feeling like you are shivering inside the building.

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1. Prevent the heat from escaping with heavy curtains. Your windows may be beautiful to look outside of, but when the cold air comes into the home, you’re going to have to deal with the heat escaping through the windows. With heavy-lined curtains that extend far below the window frame, you will be able to insulate the windows and keep the warmth where it should be. Whether you buy them from somewhere or you make your own, there are plenty of things that you can do to keep your curtains in place too. You could even add an extra layer with a set of blinds right behind them so that your home is always going to stay warm no matter what.
2. Add some more insulation. Your house should have insulation in both the attic and the ceilings and the walls, but if you are struggling to keep warm, then there’s every chance that the installation just isn’t working the way that it’s supposed to. A well-insulated house is actually able to use up to 45% less energy for both heating and cooling, and that’s not something that you can pass up. Installing insulation should be a priority for you.
3. Seal the gaps. In the average home, there will be more cracks and gaps than any other. It’s usually the equivalent of having a meter-by-a-meter window open all the time if the cracks in your home are not put back together the way they should be. The good news is you don’t have to have a home with cracked walls and cracked ceilings, especially when you can head to your local hardware store and buy the right filler paint and sealant to ensure that the cracks do not widen and get worse.
4. Add some door snakes. You might have seen them before at your grandma’s house, but door snakes can really make a difference to the amount of air that’s coming into the home. You want to be able to keep the heat in and the cold air out, and the easiest way to do it is to ensure that you have rolled up snakes by the door to prevent any leakage. When you do this, you will ensure that your home stays warmer and you feel more comfortable as a result.
5. Keep an eye on your thermostat. You should try to keep your thermostat at a 20° steady temperature all winter long. When you do this, you will be able to maintain a comfortable inside temperature while also feeling comfortable on the outside. If you don’t have a programmable thermostat on your heater, then you should make sure that you have a thermometer in your living area to keep an eye on the temperature.

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6. Keep the doors closed. If you’re not using specific rooms of your home, you do not need to have the doors open. A good way to make sure that you keep the heat in is to shut the doors of the rooms that you are not using so that the heat cannot leak out. It’s not always ideal to have the doors shut for every room, so just make sure that the rooms that you are not using are kept closed and the heat kept sealed inside.
7. Let the sunlight in. While you may want to keep your curtains closed all the time, you do need to let some sunshine in if you want some natural heat to warm the space. If you make a point of opening the window so that the UV radiation passes through the glass, you’ll be able to warm up the space in your home and still feel that throughout the day. Just make sure that as soon as the sun starts going down, you close the curtains so that you can keep that UV radiation trapped inside.
8. Insulate your hot water pipes. You should wrap all of your external pipes in insulating tape to reduce the heat loss that could occur from your hot water tank. When you do this, you ensure that your whole building stays warm and that you are able to maintain hot water and hot showers when you need to.
9. Focus on keeping the people warm, not necessarily the house. It’s so much easier to warm yourself than to warm an entire room, so make sure that everybody in your home is wearing warm slippers and thermals when they are inside. A snuggly jumper can really help to keep their heat in as well, and it could save you hundreds in utility bills.
10. Maintain the heaters. Getting all hot water appliances serviced is important if you want to maintain the heat of your home. It’s vital that you are speaking to professionals about this, however, because you don’t want to try and fix anything like heaters by yourself. That’s where things can definitely go wrong.