I set it down around 72 in the late afternoon into evening for sleeping. Then maybe 75-76 during the day until it gets a little warm. Wife and kids are home all day (we home school), so never really go much higher than that.
Like 75 during the day and 71 at night or something. But annoyingly, the same AC seems to cool different rooms very differently. We have like, I don't know, 5 ACs or something. But there is one Nest Thermostat, and when I set it to say, 71, my kids' rooms will be at 76 and my man cave will be at 66. I might need to get these: https://flair.co/products/vent
I have a ‘dumb’ vent with a fan built in that I got on Amazon for my office. It has a white 12v cord but there is shelving up to the ceiling so i was able to tuck it in to a point where you can barely see it. It makes a difference. I imagine that smart vents around your house would help but it’s another thing that can break or get disconnected from the network. HVAC is a cluster**** especially if you have multiple condensers. Combine that with uneven insulation, different quality and types of windows, etc, etc… There’s a point of diminishing returns.
Damn, some of y'all with your 68, 70, 71 degrees on the thermostat at night? Holy shizzlenit. Why? That's cold AF. Summertime: 75 or 76 when we sleep. Thin blanket. 76 during the day usually (my Brazilian born wife gets cold easy). In the winter? Depends. 73, 74 I guess? And the cat starts her nighttime snooze sleeping on me until she gets too toasty, then slides to the side. When I lived in Iowa with my dad, he always left the thermostat at 68 in the winter. My Texas blood never got used to it. If my brother would drop by to visit and Dad wasn't home yet, he'd jack the thermostat to 74 or so ("godd**n, it's freezing in here"). And I'd be grateful, knowing it wouldn't last. Then Dad would come home: "Jeezus, it's an oven in here." Back to 68. And he would sleep ON TOP of his covers at night.
I rarely go below 80 in summer during days. 81 or 82 is plenty comfortable to me...especially with a fan in the mix. At night, I do 70 on a window a/c in power saver mode (meaning, it cuts off at the reached temp and cuts back on when the temp rises (usually 20 - 30 minutes later) with central air set at 85. In winter, I usually just set it to 68 or 69. That's plenty warm in my book.
Whoever sets it at 80 is either a senior citizen or not a Houstonion. Should be anywhere between 70-76
I don't have AC and live with the doors and windows open spring to fall. I haven't touched my thermostat since turning the furnace off mid-march. I have had to turn on the ceiling fans when the temps outside reach the mid/high 80s but the lack of humidity makes it all tolerable. I do have a portable AC unit for each floor of the house but haven't taken them out of the closet and used them in the past 2 years. I should have moved to the mountains a long time ago.
New electrical plan changed my routine. My lovely .10 kwh plan expired mid-July and everything was high but I found a gimmicky plan where I thought I could beat the system. I signed up for unique plan that is .05 kwh for 20 hours of the day and .25 kwh between 6-10pm. I cool the house down to 70 degrees by 6pm and then the AC is off between 6-10pm. Doesn't get too bad (upper 70s to right at 80 close to 10pm). AC cuts on at 10pm and I have it set to 70 degrees for the night. During the day before I cool the house down for the 6pm shut off I have it at 74. I'll get my first bill in a week, interested to see how this plan is working out. One story house with just me and the misses so we don't have too much power consumption between 6-10pm.
If you really want to nerd out like me, you can track your usage in real time (almost). Free to sign up. smartmetertexas.com
I've become quite adept at figuring out how to over-ride the AC governors and temperature limitations on most hotel thermostats these days. Most have a "VIP" mode or you can go to the main setup menu and change the minimum. I even carry a couple of little tools if you need to take a screw out to get to the menu button. If I'm paying the amount they want for most hotel rooms these days, especially if I'm in a nice place, I'm turning the room to ice.
Some of y’all with your mid-high 70s, 80s. Lord. I’d keep it at 75 if I lived in Oregon, but in Texas, with this humidity. GTFOH. In the winter I don’t turn on the heat, if it’s 55 degrees in the house, then deal with it or turn on the fireplace. I can put clothes on, but I can only take so many off.
77 when I'm not home during the day. 72 while I'm home. 71 while sleeping. Though sometimes my nest thermostat likes to turn to higher temps on its own. Then I'll subtract one degree from each of those settings to teach it a lessen.
For those of us who like to turn the thermostat way up during the day and way down at night, are we really saving money? Once we turn it down, the AC has to pretty much run constantly to cool the house down again. I'm not sure how much I actually save doing this, but I do like to just give my AC some downtime. I'd like to think the less it runs the longer it will last.
Depending on how effeciently your home is insulated, and how new/effecient your AC is, you save from 0% to 11% by turning it off and then running it to cool it back down rather than leaving it down all day. The negative is you usually have hours of uncomfortable temperatures while it re-cools...so the real question..is the juice worth the squeeze to swelter while it cools back down?
My house is pretty energy efficient. I had turned it up and even when it is the temperature of Satans' Butthole outside, my house wouldn't get to the elevated temp until late in the day. I had my thermostat set to start cooling about an hour before I was usually home. That gave it a good 8 hours off and it was pretty comfortable by the time I got home. Now my wife has a new job working from home so she adjusts it some during the day. She doesn't want it as cold as I do so it runs a little more often while I am gone but not a significant amount.
