If you live somewhere that experiences a “proper” winter (snow, ice, freezing temps), when you leave your house for a multi-day vacation during winter, how low do you set your thermostat?
About 60 degrees. I worry about water pipes freezing and the extremities of the house/basement where the water pipes are are significantly lower in temperature that the place the thermostat is.
I also don’t want to come home to a really cold house.
But the longest I am gone is about 4 days.
This. Greater Boston Area so temps rarely get below 0 and we turn off the outside water in the fall. 60 seems to work just fine.
I did 60. For one thing I didn’t want to take too long to get it up to a reasonable temperature when I got back. Now I have a thermostat that is so hard to program that I don’t touch it. I hate that thermostat.
I have one that’s complicated to set a program in, but you can very simply set it to hold a certain temperature. You can’t set yours like that?
We set our thermostat to 50°F in our double-wide in Williams, AZ (were it gets to the single digits). It has PEX pipes, and a switch for the cistern pump, so I’m not terrified of the pipes freezing. Our place in Durango has copper pipes, and I am terrified of the pipes freezing, so I set the furnace to 60°F. I am also installing WiFi thermometers in the crawlspace and under the sinks, so I can get an alert if the temperature goes below 40°F. Although, I’m not sure what I’m going to do if that happens…
Our heat is a cast iron propane stove. And we have in floor heat in an entry way, the laundry room and a bath room. So it’s really a mixed bag.
When away for multiple days, we will drop to 60. At night it’s 63. My wife loves turning our cast iron stove on in the morning and sitting in front of it. I have to admit, it’s quite nice.
We used to heat with wood. That was a bit of a process.
We are on our own well. The important thing we do is turn that off when we go away. Don’t want to come back to a flood.
65F.
I figure whatever I save on heating costs by setting the thermostat lower is probably going to be considerably exceeded by the bill for repairing frozen burst pipes and cleaning up water damage.
Me too, for the same reasons. 140 year old house, water pipes in an unseated basement.
Plus I have a cat that stays behind when I’m gone for a few days, with a neighbor friend looking in on her. She does just fine at 60, with lots of soft places to curl up and sleep, big windows both east and west facing to sun herself in morning and afternoon.
Shoot, when I’m home, the thermostat is set at 66 and even then it feels indulgent. Old house, built without insulation, only some some windows upgraded to double pane, etc. at least when I replaced my roof last year ($$$) I shifted to a shingle color that was supposed to pull in a little warmth from the sun in our long winters. Probably futile but at least I try to conserve.
Use something like a Nest thermostat (one of many brands that do the same thing). You can set the thermostat from anywhere your phone has a data connection. It also has an “away” function which sets a very low low and a very high high temp the home needs to be kept in. It can also use battery operated remote temperature sensors.
Best part, you can set a normal temp hours before you arrive so the home is at a comfy temp when you get there.
Damn. You all set the temperature high. If I am out of town in winter, I will set the thermometer for 50. I’ve not had any issues with that in Canada or Minnesota.
In the UK (and I realise that our winters are pretty mild) thermostats are set to 5C as a minimum to avoid freezing.
I’d probably set mine to about 60, but I’m not sure if it would even actually reach that, except in the coldest of winters around here.
The main thing you’re worried about would be frozen pipes, and 50-60 would avoid that around here just fine without running the heater overly much.
Western Canada here where temps in the winter can crack -40. I set ours at 18c which is 65ish F and I turn the water off in the house. Done this for years and so far, no issues.
It has to be warm enough that the pipe in the coldest spot doesn’t freeze.
I fix houses that freeze in the winter. It can be very bad. I certainly would not recommend any lower than 65F / 15C. Pipes in dead space, such as shower walls freeze even though they are 16" on the ‘warm’ side of an insulated wall. Wind, framing cold spots, flaws in the envelope can all lead to frozen pipes. You want it to be warm enough in the extremities.
Most of the disasters I see are programable thermostats installed in older houses with the old two conductor thermostat wire. Since there is no power supply for the fancy thermostat it relies on battery power. Guess what happens when the battery dies.
Ive had a couple with Nest thermostats that decided to drop the temps to something stupid when it decided people were awaty because who ever designed it lives in California and has never scraped ice off their windshield.
Turn your main valve off when you leave, but also open the lowest tap in the home so the pipes can drain. Shut off valves, especially older ones often still allow a trickle. Ive seen dishwashers and laundry machines overflow because some fill valves don’t work properly without full line pressure.
I do 50 with no issue. Hell, when I lived with my brother at the old house (which I own now), we lived in the damned thing at 56F.