10 Ways to Save on Utility Bills this Summer

By: Rob Caiello

A recent post from RIS Media’s Housecall blog explains that the first utility bill of the summer can often leave homeowners shocked. Luckily, the post also offers tips and tricks for keeping your energy costs in check this summer. We’ve pulled out a few of our favorites:

  • Don’t Use an Irrigation Schedule: Irrigation schedules or timers that you can set to schedule when your garden or lawn will be watered sound nice in theory, but they actually produce quite a bit of water waste. You can’t control when it rains, and you may not be home to stop your irrigation system from going off when it does. Watering manually may seem like a chore, but when you think about all the money you can save from reducing water waste, manual watering becomes more appealing.
  • Switch to LED Bulbs: While incandescent light bulbs are cheap, they use more energy and produce quite a bit of heat compared to LED bulbs. LED bulbs tend to be a little more expensive than incandescent lights, but they last longer, produce less heat and create great energy savings in the long run. So, consider making the switch the LED lights, at least in the rooms you use most, to help lower your utility bills this summer.
  • Invest in Smart Power Strips: Connecting multiple appliances to a smart power strip that can be turned off with only one flip of a switch at night when the devices aren’t being used is a quick and easy way to help reduce energy waste. When you don’t have to unplug all your devices individually, saving energy suddenly becomes much easier!
  • Time Your Thermostat: If you want to be cost conscious this summer, you shouldn’t blast your air conditioning at all hours of the day. A lower temperature setting at night and a higher setting during the day is recommended for optimal cost savings. If you’re forgetful or aren’t always around to change it, we recommend installing a programmable thermostat that allows you to schedule your temperature changes even when you aren’t home.

Check out the full list of tips at blog.rismedia.com

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