Leaving the heat on??
Hi; We are leaving for the Southwest United States for 6 months from Oct. to April & we have a question; we plan on turning our hot water down to the vacation mode (someone will be here at least once...
Forum Discussion
Chop;
If you have a house that already has moisture problems like a damp basement or crawl space you could have problems with freezing temperatures because of the moisture already in the structure.
You can spot those houses when you walk in the door after they've been closed up for a while. When you're greeted by the moldy musty smell. They're not healthy places to live. Those people would be better off addressing the moisture problem than trying to mask the problem by leaving the heat on.
Freezing exposes problems you already have. It doesn't create the problem.
My hardwood supplier has no heat in his "showroom" of precious hardwoods. To prevent "checking" from drying out too much too quickly. If wood isn't stored in a temperature controlled environment why would it be different in your house?
Drywall, tile, and tongue & groove flooring all go thru the freeze/thaw cycle perfectly well...Unless you have a bad threshold on the front door, moisture seeping into the substrate in the bathroom, or bad roof gutters allowing water to saturate the inside of a wall.
Wouldn't you want to know about those problems if you had them? Test them with the freeze test. Don't wait for them to rot away.
I can think of no compelling reason to waste resources by leaving heat on in an unoccupied house.
The savings we experience by shutting down the house is what makes it possible for us to snowbird.
If you have a house that already has moisture problems like a damp basement or crawl space you could have problems with freezing temperatures because of the moisture already in the structure.
You can spot those houses when you walk in the door after they've been closed up for a while. When you're greeted by the moldy musty smell. They're not healthy places to live. Those people would be better off addressing the moisture problem than trying to mask the problem by leaving the heat on.
Freezing exposes problems you already have. It doesn't create the problem.
My hardwood supplier has no heat in his "showroom" of precious hardwoods. To prevent "checking" from drying out too much too quickly. If wood isn't stored in a temperature controlled environment why would it be different in your house?
Drywall, tile, and tongue & groove flooring all go thru the freeze/thaw cycle perfectly well...Unless you have a bad threshold on the front door, moisture seeping into the substrate in the bathroom, or bad roof gutters allowing water to saturate the inside of a wall.
Wouldn't you want to know about those problems if you had them? Test them with the freeze test. Don't wait for them to rot away.
I can think of no compelling reason to waste resources by leaving heat on in an unoccupied house.
The savings we experience by shutting down the house is what makes it possible for us to snowbird.
