Right now I have a second home that I need to keep heated until I can sell the first one. I spend some nights at one and some at the other. Live in the Northeast so need to keep the heat on for the pipes and all.

So my question is this. The second home is large... single story around 2450 square feet. Heated with oil and forced air coming down from the ceiling registers.

Normally, to save oil, I turn the thermostats (there are three zones) down to 55 degrees when I leave that home to stay overnight at the other. When I get back in the AM I turn them all back up to 68 - 70. Can take a while to get there, I know, but the oil system seems to warm the place up fairly quick. Just takes it a while to get to all the corners of the rooms if you know what I mean. There will be fluctuations in the temp from room to room for an hour or two and that can be a pain on these cold winter days.

Does this make sense or am I spending more $$ doing it this way rather than leave it set to 68 all the time.

Thanks!

 

Set back in your case would save money. You could add a couple of programmable stats to bring the temp up an hour or more before you arrive. But the long run for the furnace to catch up is very efficient vs normal start and stop cucling.

Bud

 

Basically, the time spent at the lower temp is the savings. I think most get that if you were to set at 60° all the time it would cost less than setting at 70° all the time. When the heat is asked to bring the temp back up it pretty much eats the savings you got while it was dropping so you want to set it back when it sits for a while at the lower temp.

 

If you're going back the next morning...... 55 is too low. You'd save more money by changing your move between housees to use the daytime to help heat the house.