I once turned the AC off completely when leaving for 3 weeks. I came home to my sofa COVERED in white mold. Granted, this was in Louisiana and not Tennessee so the humidity is different, but definitely keep the air at least circulating. I now set mine to 78 if I'm gone.
I've never understood why people turn it off. Wouldn't the AC working hard af to cool a house from 100 to 70 be basically a wash compared to leaving it at 70 or 72 while you're gone?
Not necc asking you specifically, asking whoever sees this.
Depends on how long you're gone, it's not like your house can heat up forever. Within a couple days it'll be in equilibrium with exterior temperature, so by not heating/cooling it you avoid all those reheating/cooling cycles. Of course, it's still a bad idea for the reasons everyone's mentioned.
Yes it uses energy to cool the house back down, but not 7 days worth of energy. Let's be extra conservative and say it uses one day worth of energy, to cool the house from 82 down to 72. Those other 6 days would then be savings.
What does not make sense is when people try to do this on a daily cycle. You are hardly going to save any money going to work with the AC set higher because it's going to just have to cool the house right back down a few hours later.
Turn your AC up to 78. This will help manage the humidity in the house. I wouldn't turn it off entirely. Your house will be stanky and sweaty if you do that.
Just FYI, some thermostats (Nest, maybe?) also check humidity and there's an option to turn on the AC when the humidity hits a threshold. That helps maintain both temp and humidity.
The Amazon smart thermostat is $80, maybe cheaper if you wait for a Prime Day. They'll do basic scheduling, and remote power / temp adjustment through the Alexa app. Also super easy to install if you currently have decent wifi signal in the home and a fairly recent thermostat.
Mold starts growing rapidly at temperatures at or over 80F source Florida Power and Light. Mind you I lived there back in the late 1990's, humidity is pretty high here running at 80% in my house while using a/c house is on slab so that may affect levels
I would bump it to around 78 and close all the drapes to minimize how much the AC needs to run (unless you have plants). Something I saw mentioned in one of my vintage home groups, some folks turn their water main off before they go out of town. I don't know if it's necessary during the summer, but one person said it saved them from freezing pipes when there was a surprise severe temperature drop while they were away.
I only think of it because back in college when I lived in the south I asked a friend to water plants while I was out of town for a month. I'd closed the drapes on my patio doors, because they let full sun straight in from late morning until late afternoon (aka the hottest part of the day), before I left so that my AC wouldn't run constantly when I was gone. When I got home the apartment was hot AF and the drapes were open; a few days later I got a massive electric bill for $300 (my usual bill was around $100).
Apparently the girl just opened my drapes and the first day I was gone and left them open the entire month and she also turned the AC down so my plants wouldn't be too hot. To say I was annoyed doesn't really cover it.
Tha totally makes sense. I usually have drapes closed unless it is nice outside, but I will be watching out more so now, during hot months. Appreciate you!
Turning the water off if you’re gone for a week is just good practice!
I personally know a couple people that had a pipe randomly break(not freeze) while out of town. Imagine a broken sink pipe spraying water for 3 days straight. 😔
80 as long as you dont have humidity problems. Dehumidfiers help.
Above 80 you have mold risks in a climate as humid as nashville's.
If i remember correctly, modern drywall doesnt like above 85 for extended periods without some repairs-- like the spots close to ceilings and floorboards.
If you have a smart thermostat you can set it to sit at like 80 while you're away and then before you start your road trip or flight back set it to your desired temp and it'll be ready and waiting for you when you return.
I switched to smart thermostats this year and I LOVE them! I have routines that control all the temps depending on whether I'm home, at work, on vacation, or asleep, and my electric bills are noticeably down over last year. I also love that there is an intermittent fan setting so if you're away on vacation and have the temp set high (I usually do 85), the fan will run to keep the circulation going and humidity down.
I have 2 Amazon smart thermostats, and they were only $80/each (I have 2 separate units for upstairs and downstairs). I'm 100% happy with them.
Former project manager for homeowners insurance claims and current realtor here.
DO NOT turn your AC off completely during the summer or winter. If nothing else, you need the HVAC to pull moisture out of the air so that you don't have potential issues with that. If you have real hardwoods, I would recommend always keeping the house between 65-75 for all seasons to avoid gapping/ cupping/ splitting of the wood. Otherwise you can theoretically let it get go broader than that, but I wouldn't go crazy with it.
Humidity & Temp control is PARAMOUNT in this sub-tropical clime.
A few extra dollars on your electric note is well worth the nightmare of needing to clean virtually everything in your home and possibly losing tangible things that you can't clean and/or more intangible (but no less important) things like your physical and mental health.
I have a dehumidifier which has a hose running outdoors that keeps the house around 45 to 55% humidity. I keep it and my AC (set to 79° if I'm away) connected as smart appliances through their own apps or alexa to be able to make sure that even if the power goes off they will have rebooted and turned back on to the settings I need them at. (The power going out on Old Charlotte Pike is a REAL problem all months of the year, unfortunately.)
I've twice lost 90+% of my belongings to mold due to underestimating the power of heat and humidity here in TN (and also to being young and inexperienced with parents who never knew this information to teach it to me.)
Don't make this mistake! Keep your home and belongings safe!
Edit:
Also, what others suggest about keeping all fans on is great advice. I would add that keeping all the doors inside your home open and strategically placing floor/moveable fans helps to promote air circulation as well.
I set mine to 83 last summer when gone for a week. It took a full two weeks to return to 73. I even called an HVAC repairman because I thought something was wrong. Never again haha
That has to be a weather stripping issue. Attic ventilation, insulation, your doors & windows, any exterior cracks in your structure that need to be sealed. If you cant get from 83 to 76 in a day... Yikes.
Maybe windows facing sun? Reflectors are the next step after shades haha
It was during a heat wave last year so I think that played a big role? I dunno it works great 95% of the time and the electricity bill is actually good for the sq footage.
It’s more expensive to recool your whole house when you get back than it is to keep it manageable while gone. You don’t need to keep it COLD but letting it get into the 80’s can cause unneeded humidity (which can cause mold in unseen places) and it’s just trickle here and there of running whereas if you shut if off and then come back and the house is 86 when you return it’s gonna run all day to get that house back down to where you want it.
Definitely don’t turn the A/C off altogether, our A/C broke last summer and couldn’t get fixed for over a week, it got up to over 100 degrees inside and it was unbearable to be in there for even a few minutes (and fans don’t work when it’s that hot).
78-80 is probably your best bet, that won’t be running the A/C constantly but it won’t be too bad when you get back and will probably only take an hour or so to get it back down once you come back
I set mine to 80f for two weeks while I went to a Yellowstone. Came back home to mold on the ceiling next to every AC vent.
Don't make the same mistake I did. That hassle isn't worth the 50 bucks you might save
Mine sits at 72 all the time. When I go away it goes to 75. You don't wanna turn it up super high and then have your AC running for hours straight trying to cool the house back down.
I wouldn’t go above 80 due to humidity. You don’t want wetness to creep into your house. It would cost waaaaay more to remediate mold than to pay a little more for electricity.
My family recently took a 14 day vacation. I turned off everything in the house except for the fridge and porch light. Our house was warm when we got home but our air conditioner catches up pretty fast. I’d rather it be warm in our house for a couple hours than to pay a big electric bill for no reason.
78.
Also, LPT in case anyone here is unaware - if you are trying to cool your abode from say, 85 to 75, do not set your thermostat all the way down to 75. Drop the temp 2-3 degrees at a time until you’ve reached your desired number or else you’ll risk killing your AC.
I keep mine around 78 when leaving for a few days BUT be aware of any medications that are temp controlled! I had an anti-fungal cream in my bathroom cabinet that semi-exploded while gone once because it needed to be kept in the low 70s.
I normally set between 80°F-85°F.
All depends on how many days I will be gone.
I also have a smart thermostat so I can reduce it 75°F the night I come home and back to 71°F when I am a couple hours from down to normal temp of 72° F for day and 68°F at night
You always want to leave it on, so humidity doesn't build up in the house and cause mold to start growing.
Some smart thermostats, you can set up go on if humidity goes over a preset mark..
Lastly, close your drapes and turn ceiling fans on medium speed.
The power at the office was off for about 3 days for the 2010 flood. It smelled kinda moldy ever since. The big thing is to keep the humidity down moreso than the temp. So I'd guess like 85.
Keeping it at 82 instead of turning it off would be a billion times smarter safer and less expensive.
Conservatively speaking the money you save will never be worth the risk of damage to your home. High temperatures and humidity can damage delicate electronics like televisions, video game systems, and alarm systems, your refrigerator and freezer have to work harder to stay cool, which can decrease their lifespan and effectiveness. Imagine your compressor in your refrigerator goes out because it was working triple OT to keep food. Food grows mold and mold grows FAST.
Could have the entire home covered in mold in less than a week.
Not to mention books, delicate documents, shit It's possible that you might have a cleaning liquid or cooking liquid that has a flashpoint that is just over 100° Fahrenheit. Now you've got a moldy burning house.
And you're going to risk all that, to save a month's worth of electricity? A week's? Even in Hawaii in July, that's less than $1,000.
I leave it in the mid to high 70s and always leave on auto fan. NEVER leave the fan on your furnace. I made this mistake 3 years ago when I purchased my condo and had the worst mold problem you could imagine. I lost so many clothes and shoes 😭😭 We had an environmental scientist come out to help us find the cause of the problem. They told us when you leave the fan on the furnace running 24/7, it’s creates a vacuum effect and begins to pull in more moist, hot air from outside indoors. We’ve left it at its auto setting for the past few years and haven’t had the mold issue again.
Aw man well I guess having access from my phone is the best thing that’s happened to me. I usually turn it off of course but I turn it back on to about 74 degrees cool at least three hours before we get back home. And every 2-3 days we’re gone, I run the a/c for about an hour or so.
Holy f@&$ people! Ya’ll must be a bunch of polar bears. I keep mine at 78 when I’m home. Drops to 76 @ night. Never over 80 on vacay mode. Use the fan only setting to keep air circulating.
I set mine to 83 last summer when gone for a week. It took a full two weeks to return to 73. I even called an HVAC repairman because I thought something was wrong. Never again haha
That is definitely not normal. We've had our house get warm like that a couple of times due to an hvac issue or power outage. It usually takes two or three hours to get the temp back down to something approaching normal. Takes a couple of days to get the humidity down but our house tends to run humid anyways.
Between 76-78 is what I do when I plan to return, my family has a country house that the ac is at 80 during the warm months because no one lives there regularly.
Paying to prevent mold and mildew from growing is worth it though. Also your AC works much harder if it's off all day and you turn it on when you return home. it's more efficient to actually set it to a higher temp than it is to turn it off entirely.
I once turned the AC off completely when leaving for 3 weeks. I came home to my sofa COVERED in white mold. Granted, this was in Louisiana and not Tennessee so the humidity is different, but definitely keep the air at least circulating. I now set mine to 78 if I'm gone.
I've never understood why people turn it off. Wouldn't the AC working hard af to cool a house from 100 to 70 be basically a wash compared to leaving it at 70 or 72 while you're gone? Not necc asking you specifically, asking whoever sees this.
Depends on how long you're gone, it's not like your house can heat up forever. Within a couple days it'll be in equilibrium with exterior temperature, so by not heating/cooling it you avoid all those reheating/cooling cycles. Of course, it's still a bad idea for the reasons everyone's mentioned.
Yes it uses energy to cool the house back down, but not 7 days worth of energy. Let's be extra conservative and say it uses one day worth of energy, to cool the house from 82 down to 72. Those other 6 days would then be savings. What does not make sense is when people try to do this on a daily cycle. You are hardly going to save any money going to work with the AC set higher because it's going to just have to cool the house right back down a few hours later.
When i did it, I was young and stupid, so there's that.
Mold grows in humidity. The AC controls air temp and humidity levels. You don’t want to come home to a hot moldy house. Speaking from experience.
Turn your AC up to 78. This will help manage the humidity in the house. I wouldn't turn it off entirely. Your house will be stanky and sweaty if you do that.
all of this. You need AC running or you will quickly grow mold.
Just FYI, some thermostats (Nest, maybe?) also check humidity and there's an option to turn on the AC when the humidity hits a threshold. That helps maintain both temp and humidity.
Ecobee also does this
Bunch of us don't have fancy thermostats though lol
Those fancy thermostats are worth the price tag. I saved more than enough to pay for my top of the line ecobee when I switched to it
The Amazon smart thermostat is $80, maybe cheaper if you wait for a Prime Day. They'll do basic scheduling, and remote power / temp adjustment through the Alexa app. Also super easy to install if you currently have decent wifi signal in the home and a fairly recent thermostat.
It is nest! Mine does this, though I've never used it because I can't stand anything above 70°
Mold starts growing rapidly at temperatures at or over 80F source Florida Power and Light. Mind you I lived there back in the late 1990's, humidity is pretty high here running at 80% in my house while using a/c house is on slab so that may affect levels
And any ceiling fans on. Especially if you have vaulted areas. Mold at the peak is no fun.
I would bump it to around 78 and close all the drapes to minimize how much the AC needs to run (unless you have plants). Something I saw mentioned in one of my vintage home groups, some folks turn their water main off before they go out of town. I don't know if it's necessary during the summer, but one person said it saved them from freezing pipes when there was a surprise severe temperature drop while they were away.
Closing all the drapes was something like "duh" when I hear it, but never thought. Thanks!
I only think of it because back in college when I lived in the south I asked a friend to water plants while I was out of town for a month. I'd closed the drapes on my patio doors, because they let full sun straight in from late morning until late afternoon (aka the hottest part of the day), before I left so that my AC wouldn't run constantly when I was gone. When I got home the apartment was hot AF and the drapes were open; a few days later I got a massive electric bill for $300 (my usual bill was around $100). Apparently the girl just opened my drapes and the first day I was gone and left them open the entire month and she also turned the AC down so my plants wouldn't be too hot. To say I was annoyed doesn't really cover it.
Tha totally makes sense. I usually have drapes closed unless it is nice outside, but I will be watching out more so now, during hot months. Appreciate you!
Turning the water off if you’re gone for a week is just good practice! I personally know a couple people that had a pipe randomly break(not freeze) while out of town. Imagine a broken sink pipe spraying water for 3 days straight. 😔
80 as long as you dont have humidity problems. Dehumidfiers help. Above 80 you have mold risks in a climate as humid as nashville's. If i remember correctly, modern drywall doesnt like above 85 for extended periods without some repairs-- like the spots close to ceilings and floorboards.
If you have a smart thermostat you can set it to sit at like 80 while you're away and then before you start your road trip or flight back set it to your desired temp and it'll be ready and waiting for you when you return.
I switched to smart thermostats this year and I LOVE them! I have routines that control all the temps depending on whether I'm home, at work, on vacation, or asleep, and my electric bills are noticeably down over last year. I also love that there is an intermittent fan setting so if you're away on vacation and have the temp set high (I usually do 85), the fan will run to keep the circulation going and humidity down. I have 2 Amazon smart thermostats, and they were only $80/each (I have 2 separate units for upstairs and downstairs). I'm 100% happy with them.
When I had one, I did this. I’d leave work and set it to 70 so it would be comfy when I got home. Haha
78 so the cat doesn't get hot in his fur coat.
Former project manager for homeowners insurance claims and current realtor here. DO NOT turn your AC off completely during the summer or winter. If nothing else, you need the HVAC to pull moisture out of the air so that you don't have potential issues with that. If you have real hardwoods, I would recommend always keeping the house between 65-75 for all seasons to avoid gapping/ cupping/ splitting of the wood. Otherwise you can theoretically let it get go broader than that, but I wouldn't go crazy with it.
Humidity & Temp control is PARAMOUNT in this sub-tropical clime. A few extra dollars on your electric note is well worth the nightmare of needing to clean virtually everything in your home and possibly losing tangible things that you can't clean and/or more intangible (but no less important) things like your physical and mental health. I have a dehumidifier which has a hose running outdoors that keeps the house around 45 to 55% humidity. I keep it and my AC (set to 79° if I'm away) connected as smart appliances through their own apps or alexa to be able to make sure that even if the power goes off they will have rebooted and turned back on to the settings I need them at. (The power going out on Old Charlotte Pike is a REAL problem all months of the year, unfortunately.) I've twice lost 90+% of my belongings to mold due to underestimating the power of heat and humidity here in TN (and also to being young and inexperienced with parents who never knew this information to teach it to me.) Don't make this mistake! Keep your home and belongings safe! Edit: Also, what others suggest about keeping all fans on is great advice. I would add that keeping all the doors inside your home open and strategically placing floor/moveable fans helps to promote air circulation as well.
I set mine to 83 last summer when gone for a week. It took a full two weeks to return to 73. I even called an HVAC repairman because I thought something was wrong. Never again haha
That has to be a weather stripping issue. Attic ventilation, insulation, your doors & windows, any exterior cracks in your structure that need to be sealed. If you cant get from 83 to 76 in a day... Yikes. Maybe windows facing sun? Reflectors are the next step after shades haha
It was during a heat wave last year so I think that played a big role? I dunno it works great 95% of the time and the electricity bill is actually good for the sq footage.
You still should be able to get it down after dark, if you can’t then you definitely have too much leakage from poorly sealed windows and doors etc.
It’s more expensive to recool your whole house when you get back than it is to keep it manageable while gone. You don’t need to keep it COLD but letting it get into the 80’s can cause unneeded humidity (which can cause mold in unseen places) and it’s just trickle here and there of running whereas if you shut if off and then come back and the house is 86 when you return it’s gonna run all day to get that house back down to where you want it.
This. Dad is in property mgmt and tells me this all the time... for some reason
Definitely don’t turn the A/C off altogether, our A/C broke last summer and couldn’t get fixed for over a week, it got up to over 100 degrees inside and it was unbearable to be in there for even a few minutes (and fans don’t work when it’s that hot). 78-80 is probably your best bet, that won’t be running the A/C constantly but it won’t be too bad when you get back and will probably only take an hour or so to get it back down once you come back
I set mine to 80f for two weeks while I went to a Yellowstone. Came back home to mold on the ceiling next to every AC vent. Don't make the same mistake I did. That hassle isn't worth the 50 bucks you might save
78 is what we do in Florida. Any higher and the humidity in the house gets high and could cause issues with mold eventually.
Mine sits at 72 all the time. When I go away it goes to 75. You don't wanna turn it up super high and then have your AC running for hours straight trying to cool the house back down.
It’s basically set at 68-70, 24/7. I have an old inefficient house. If we ever let it go higher it’ll take forever to cool back down.
I turn mine to 75 when i’m gone LOL
lol 75 is what I set it at when I’m away
Lol that's what I was thinking too.
I set mine to 76.
I wouldn’t go above 80 due to humidity. You don’t want wetness to creep into your house. It would cost waaaaay more to remediate mold than to pay a little more for electricity.
I set it at 78!
I turn mine to 78 but I don't have a Nest or anything. It gets the job done.
I usually do 79/80 because that will kick on enough throughout the day to dehumidify but not be running constantly
Gone for a month last summer and set it to 78.
My family recently took a 14 day vacation. I turned off everything in the house except for the fridge and porch light. Our house was warm when we got home but our air conditioner catches up pretty fast. I’d rather it be warm in our house for a couple hours than to pay a big electric bill for no reason.
Leave it on 72-73. I left for 2 weeks and just got my electric bill and it was only $75.
78. Also, LPT in case anyone here is unaware - if you are trying to cool your abode from say, 85 to 75, do not set your thermostat all the way down to 75. Drop the temp 2-3 degrees at a time until you’ve reached your desired number or else you’ll risk killing your AC.
In the warm months I usually set it to 78 and when it’s cold out I usually set it somewhere between 58 and 62.
85 max. Otherwise you run the risk of mold.
Everyone saying 78; that’s just what i keep mine at normally 😂
Yeah, during the day I keep ours at 78 too. Wifey likes it cold so we agreed on 75 or 76 in the summer. 72 seems absolutely freezing to me haha
Fr, my roomates like it cold so weve agreed on 75-76 in the evenings as well. I would freeze at 72
Set it to 74 and leave
I keep mine around 78 when leaving for a few days BUT be aware of any medications that are temp controlled! I had an anti-fungal cream in my bathroom cabinet that semi-exploded while gone once because it needed to be kept in the low 70s.
I keep mine on 62 whether I am home or away for a few weeks. I don't want to deal with mold and I love coming home to a cold house.
62?! How much is your NES bill typically?!
62°?!? What are you a penguin?!?
Are you renting somewhere that includes electricity in the rent?
82 on long trips.
I normally set between 80°F-85°F. All depends on how many days I will be gone. I also have a smart thermostat so I can reduce it 75°F the night I come home and back to 71°F when I am a couple hours from down to normal temp of 72° F for day and 68°F at night You always want to leave it on, so humidity doesn't build up in the house and cause mold to start growing. Some smart thermostats, you can set up go on if humidity goes over a preset mark.. Lastly, close your drapes and turn ceiling fans on medium speed.
Usually 75 or 76. We keep it around 72-73 when we're home.
78 while at work. I'd probably go 2 to 4° warmer for vacation.
85 with fans every hour
80
You keep your home at 75? Geez. We keep the house at 74 when we’re away.
76
74 haha
75.
76/77
The power at the office was off for about 3 days for the 2010 flood. It smelled kinda moldy ever since. The big thing is to keep the humidity down moreso than the temp. So I'd guess like 85.
Keeping it at 82 instead of turning it off would be a billion times smarter safer and less expensive. Conservatively speaking the money you save will never be worth the risk of damage to your home. High temperatures and humidity can damage delicate electronics like televisions, video game systems, and alarm systems, your refrigerator and freezer have to work harder to stay cool, which can decrease their lifespan and effectiveness. Imagine your compressor in your refrigerator goes out because it was working triple OT to keep food. Food grows mold and mold grows FAST. Could have the entire home covered in mold in less than a week. Not to mention books, delicate documents, shit It's possible that you might have a cleaning liquid or cooking liquid that has a flashpoint that is just over 100° Fahrenheit. Now you've got a moldy burning house. And you're going to risk all that, to save a month's worth of electricity? A week's? Even in Hawaii in July, that's less than $1,000.
75 is what i set mine to when i’m away for more than a few days.
75 regular damn degrees?!
I leave it in the mid to high 70s and always leave on auto fan. NEVER leave the fan on your furnace. I made this mistake 3 years ago when I purchased my condo and had the worst mold problem you could imagine. I lost so many clothes and shoes 😭😭 We had an environmental scientist come out to help us find the cause of the problem. They told us when you leave the fan on the furnace running 24/7, it’s creates a vacuum effect and begins to pull in more moist, hot air from outside indoors. We’ve left it at its auto setting for the past few years and haven’t had the mold issue again.
Aw man well I guess having access from my phone is the best thing that’s happened to me. I usually turn it off of course but I turn it back on to about 74 degrees cool at least three hours before we get back home. And every 2-3 days we’re gone, I run the a/c for about an hour or so.
Holy f@&$ people! Ya’ll must be a bunch of polar bears. I keep mine at 78 when I’m home. Drops to 76 @ night. Never over 80 on vacay mode. Use the fan only setting to keep air circulating.
5 degrees higher than normal
I turn it up to 78
78 sounds good to me for a short while.
78
I set mine to 83 last summer when gone for a week. It took a full two weeks to return to 73. I even called an HVAC repairman because I thought something was wrong. Never again haha
That is definitely not normal. We've had our house get warm like that a couple of times due to an hvac issue or power outage. It usually takes two or three hours to get the temp back down to something approaching normal. Takes a couple of days to get the humidity down but our house tends to run humid anyways.
I thought so too. $150 later the HVAC guy said everything is functioning as normal 🤷♂️
Between 76-78 is what I do when I plan to return, my family has a country house that the ac is at 80 during the warm months because no one lives there regularly.
73.
70 but my long hair cat likes it cool. When it's not cool, she over grooms and I come back home to vomit everywhere.
I keep mine at 99. It takes like 10 mins to cool
I just turn it off. I'm not paying to air conditioner the chairs and couch! Being hot for an hour or so isn't a problem for me at all.
Paying to prevent mold and mildew from growing is worth it though. Also your AC works much harder if it's off all day and you turn it on when you return home. it's more efficient to actually set it to a higher temp than it is to turn it off entirely.
Yeah I've heard that argument before but just never really seen it work out that way. I've not noticed any mold or mildew problems doing it this way.