Minor Home Upgrades and Repairs That Can Lower Your Utility Bills

Cutting down the cost of utilities is good for your pockets and saving for the environment. Luckily, you can do a couple of minor upgrades in your home to help lower your utility bills. Here are some of the top upgrades you need to consider to tackle down household costs:

Install Programmable/Smart Thermostat

Thermostats help detect and adjust the temperature in our HVAC system. While manual thermostats are known to waste a lot of energy, upgrading to programmable units can actually help reduce such wastage.

These thermostats can be set to automatically turn off or reduce heating and cooling when not needed.

Replace HVAC Filters

Your air conditioner does more work than just keeping you cool. It also ensures the air you breathe is clean and fresh. However, as the AC traps and filters out allergens and dust, the filters get clogged, reducing its energy efficiency.

For this reason, you need to constantly change your filters to achieve more energy efficiency. At the same time, you can consider going for a professional HVAC repair to ensure your unit works perfectly.

Fix Running Toilets

One of the major causes of the high-water bill is running toilets. If you have a faulty or running toilet, the chances are that you are paying for what’s going right down the drainage system.

The good thing is that running toilets are easy to fix. You simply need to diagnose the problem and have it repaired.

automated switches/plugsautomated blinds

      some saving energy ideas to consider      

Insulate Your Attic

You may not realize how much of your heating and cooling is escaping through the top of your home. Since heat rises, this is especially true in the colder months of the year.

One way to combat this is to add insulation to your attic space. This can be traditional fiberglass or spray insulation, among other options.

Either way, it will make a big difference in your energy consumption and ultimately your bills.

Opt for Low-E Windows

If your home is due for new windows, be sure to take energy into account. Low emissivity windows (low-E) work perfectly in reducing your energy utility bills.

First, these windows allow natural lighting; hence no need of turning the lights on. Secondly, these windows offer perfect heat insulation, thereby reducing unnecessary heat loss.

During warm weather, these windows allow little heat to penetrate. On colder winters, they allow in more heat to keep you warm.

Switch to Solar

This may sound expensive upfront, but it’s fairly easy to get large tax cuts for the installation of solar panels. Additionally, installing a solar system is a sure energy upgrade that will significantly reduce your utility costs.

As a clean source of energy, solar power will enable you to use less power from the grid, hence cost-efficient. The reason why installing panels is a major upgrade is that they reduce power bills and cut down your carbon footprint.

other related articles of interest:

Make Your Home More Energy Efficient to Save on Utility Costs

You Can Reduce Your High Winter Heating Bills

Final Thoughts

Cutting down the utility bills can be tricky sometimes. With the tough economic times, every homeowner is trying their best to save some penny on their monthly bills.

Fortunately, you can do several minor upgrades and repairs in your home to achieve this dream. The above mentioned are top tips you can use to reduce monthly bills.

Image credit: lower your utility bills by twenty20.com

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