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These days, utility bills seem to be inching up every year, leaving homeowners with hefty electricity and gas bills to pay every month. The thing is, you need energy to keep your home operational and comfortable. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to waste lots of energy to make that happen.
Luckily, there are a number of ways to not only save energy in your home, but save money, too. Consider following these energy-saving tips.
No matter what type of lights you use inside or outside your home, try LED (Light-Emitting Diode) lighting. LED lights use 86% less electricity than comparable incandescent lights and have numerous safety advantages. For example, LED lights are shatterproof, present no fire hazard, and, because they emit almost no heat, are safe to the touch.
While they may be a little more expensive to buy, they’ll save you a lot of money in the long run since they use far less energy and don’t need to be replaced nearly as often.
When your home is filled with people, or the ovens are working overtime, or both, the temperature can rise by several degrees. Rather than opening a window or leaving a door ajar, consider lowering your home’s thermostat, or turning off the heat altogether.
Each degree “colder” that you set you set your thermostat decreases your home’s energy usage up to 3 percent.
While you’re at it, consider installing a programmable thermostat that allows you to program the temperature at specific times of the day. For instance, while you’re at work and no one is home, the temperature can be turned down a few degrees to save on energy.
Then, you can program the thermostat to turn the temperature up about an hour before you arrive home from work to make sure your home is comfortable, All these changes can be made without your intervention when you program the thermostat beforehand.
If you’re the type who likes to plan your meals in advance, you may want to consider preparing foods simultaneously to help cut down on energy expenditure.
Prepping meals in advance leads to running the oven, microwave or stove-top multiple times for each served dish. When possible, prepare foods at the same time and warm in the oven at the same time. In running your appliances less, you will save on energy costs.
Some dishes require hand-washing. For everything else, use a dishwasher. Dishwashers use less water than is required to wash and rinse plates, utensils and pots and pans by hand. They can also use up to 50% less energy than is required to heat the water you’ll need to wash your dishes manually.
That said, only run the dishwasher when it is completely full rather than running it with space leftover. If there are dishes in there that you must use soon after, wash them by hand. Everything else can wait until the dishwasher has been fully loaded.
By running the dishwasher only at capacity, you can save on all that water and heat that’s used to wash and dry your dishes. Speaking of which, consider only using the dishwasher to wash the dishes.
Rather than using extreme heat to dry them, open up the dishwasher while the dishes are still wet after they’ve been washed , and allow them to air dry. Otherwise, towel-dry them yourself. This alone can save a ton of energy.
There are so many ways to save on energy in your home that will help the environment and your pocketbook.
Are you curious about mortgages, or are you ready to apply for one to buy a home? If so, Sammamish Mortgage can help. We are a local mortgage company that serves borrowers in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and Colorado. We offer many mortgage programs to buyers all over the Pacific Northwest and have been doing so since 1992. Contact us today with any questions you have about mortgages.
Whether you’re buying a home or ready to refinance, our professionals can help.
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No Obligation and transparency 24/7. Instantly compare live rates and costs from our network of lenders across the country. Real-time accurate rates and closing costs for a variety of loan programs custom to your specific situation.