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Old 01-17-2021, 07:57 AM
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Default Best Home Renos for Saving Money

So was looking at the gas bill yesterday and gas consumption, which isn't a large part of the overall gas bill, is running at about 1/3 what it was last year, for the months of Nov and Dec. In mid Oct we had additional Cellulose insulation sprayed into the attic of the house and the attached garage. The house is now 12 years old and the original insulation had settled some, plus the garage had next to none, which I didn't know until we were replacing a couple of roof vents in early October.

I know it has been warmer this year for Nov and Dec than it was the previous two years, and the actual dollar savings is not truly huge, but I was quite impressed that the extra insulation made such a difference. Total job was about $3,000 for 3700 sq ft of attic space so it will take quite a while to recover the cost in savings, but the other bonus is the house furnace and the one in the garage come on far less often.

Curious what upgrades others have done that have provided a large improvement in usability, cost savings etc. Looking for ideas for the coming year.
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Old 01-17-2021, 08:20 AM
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3700 sq ft of attic space

Move to a smaller house.

Grizz
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Old 01-17-2021, 08:23 AM
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3700 sq ft of attic space

Move to a smaller house.

Grizz
Dean has a very nice cabin

When I go outside when it is cold, I put a toque on. You adding insulation is the same, so I think you already did the #1 thing you could, especially for the money you spent.

Why not have in the utility company to do one of their energy audits of your home. You will get the best answers for your home that way.
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Old 01-17-2021, 08:28 AM
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The cheapest energy is the energy you don't use. When I built my houses, I always went r50 for the blow-in and ICF for foundation, with styrofoam under the slabs and hydronic heating in the garage and basement. My last house I built that I'm currently living in, has about R70-75 blown in attic, because the guy doing it was a friend and had extra bags of insulation from previous job, and I had cold beer for him and his helper (I'd asked for R50). That house holds heat unbelievably well. Thicker better insulated garage door really helps as well, not a huge difference in price either. If I'd put in triple pane glass it would be better yet but that is a big extra expense compared to over insulating attic, and the gain is hard to justify.

If I was building again, I would use ICF righ to the rafters.
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Old 01-17-2021, 08:40 AM
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If we had a -35 or so winter I'm sure you'd notice the savings a bit more. Especially since you mentioned in another thread that you have been monitoring your cost of living for quite some time.

We have an older house, older part of town, and I'm sure all the insulation in the walls has sunk pretty much to floor level. When we get a cold snap our furnace works overtime trying to keep up. And the walls are freezing.

We've been debating for a while now to tear down the drywall one room at a time to reinsulate. But with work and chasing the kids around, it's hard to even imagine having time for such a project.
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Old 01-17-2021, 09:00 AM
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If we had a -35 or so winter I'm sure you'd notice the savings a bit more. Especially since you mentioned in another thread that you have been monitoring your cost of living for quite some time.

We have an older house, older part of town, and I'm sure all the insulation in the walls has sunk pretty much to floor level. When we get a cold snap our furnace works overtime trying to keep up. And the walls are freezing.

We've been debating for a while now to tear down the drywall one room at a time to reinsulate. But with work and chasing the kids around, it's hard to even imagine having time for such a project.

They can actually re-insulate your walls much easier and cheaper than tearing out the drywall. Options include spray in foam or cellulose, adding insulation on the outside etc and a bunch of other options. We had the external clad job done on a house in GP because the walls were only 2x4.

Twisted, to me ICF is the rigid insulation that goes into making an insulated type foundation. We have that on this house and the previous one. Are you talking just using the board to the rafters or actually using the insulated concrete and board all the way to the rafters, for the walls??
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Old 01-17-2021, 10:41 AM
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I remember a while back, the Gov offered a service where they sent out an inspector to assess your house and tell you what specific things were losing the most energy. Not sure if its still around but even if you had to pay a consultant to inspect your place it might be money well spent (as long as they don't own a spray foam company or furnace sales etc...)

I think every house would be slightly different. My first house (built in 1934)
had one room that was always really cold. I pulled the drywall and wood off the wall to find the walls had about 3 layers of newspaper stuck to the exterior wall.
So in a situation like that it made sense to tear the wall apart and insulate it, which probably wouldn't make sense for my current 2x6 home.
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Old 01-17-2021, 01:12 PM
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Originally Posted by Dean2 View Post
So was looking at the gas bill yesterday and gas consumption, which isn't a large part of the overall gas bill, is running at about 1/3 what it was last year, for the months of Nov and Dec. In mid Oct we had additional Cellulose insulation sprayed into the attic of the house and the attached garage. The house is now 12 years old and the original insulation had settled some, plus the garage had next to none, which I didn't know until we were replacing a couple of roof vents in early October.

I know it has been warmer this year for Nov and Dec than it was the previous two years, and the actual dollar savings is not truly huge, but I was quite impressed that the extra insulation made such a difference. Total job was about $3,000 for 3700 sq ft of attic space so it will take quite a while to recover the cost in savings, but the other bonus is the house furnace and the one in the garage come on far less often.

Curious what upgrades others have done that have provided a large improvement in usability, cost savings etc. Looking for ideas for the coming year.

The NDP offered a grant for topping up insulation if your house was low but I think that is removed now.
We did a few jobs through our insulation company doing that.
I would recommend people go in there attic and measure their insulation depths. Cellulose at r40 should be 10.84 inches settled depth and r50 13.41.
Fiberglass should be 14.9 and 18.7 respectively.
I have gone into houses that were a year or 2 old and measured for some guys and they were way under insulated, so I told them to call the builder and get it done for free as it wasn't done to the spec the builder promised.

All the buildings we do now that are commercial or acreage rated are r50 ceilings farm can still get away with r40.

Also current house I am in has new insulation as well as new windows, it is larger than our last one but has lower gas and electricity consumption.

Dean another thing if you have a large south facing roof is solar panels. Govt is introducing new grants again to make it more worthwhile. Figured it out for a south roof on a 42x60 shop and they would pay for themselves in 10 years. With the old grants under NDP it was better.
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Old 01-17-2021, 01:34 PM
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I live in a old house, one of the things that bothers me is the floor is cold near the outside walls , and I don’t think there much insulation in the walls or the might have been settle . Anyone know way to add some insulation into the walls, With out tearing the walls down ?
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Old 01-17-2021, 01:41 PM
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I live in a old house, one of the things that bothers me is the floor is cold near the outside walls , and I don’t think there much insulation in the walls or the might have been settle . Anyone know way to add some insulation into the walls, With out tearing the walls down ?
I have heard of companies punching holes in walls and blowing them full but usually for larger cavities not all along a house wall. If you plan on residing your house anytime soon you can add styrofoam and new tyvek would help a ton
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Old 01-17-2021, 01:41 PM
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When I first read your comment it said "I love in an old house and the floor is cold" so I was thinking the easy fix would be to not do it on the floor or at least make sure she was on the bottom.


To answer your question, you can have insulation added to the outside of the house and then sided over, you can get spray in insulation sprayed into the walls and you can get cellulose sprayed in too, all without removing the drywall. The last two you will need to patch the holes they used to spray into.
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Old 01-17-2021, 01:44 PM
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If you have teenagers and a wife, a thermostat with a password, a shutoff valve on your hot water tank, timers on all light switches lol.
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Old 01-17-2021, 01:44 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by fishtank View Post
I live in a old house, one of the things that bothers me is the floor is cold near the outside walls , and I don’t think there much insulation in the walls or the might have been settle . Anyone know way to add some insulation into the walls, With out tearing the walls down ?
Its important to draft seal (Caulk) the area between the rim joist, and the foundation and insulate between the floor joists over the foundation walls, this is a cold spot in most older homes
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Old 01-17-2021, 01:50 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Dean2 View Post
When I first read your comment it said "I love in an old house and the floor is cold" so I was thinking the easy fix would be to not do it on the floor or at least make sure she was on the bottom.


To answer your question, you can have insulation added to the outside of the house and then sided over, you can get spray in insulation sprayed into the walls and you can get cellulose sprayed in too, all without removing the drywall. The last two you will need to patch the holes they used to spray into.
Auto correct on my phone lol . I have cedar planks siding , so have to remove them then adding insulation. might go with spray foam insulation seeing that they don’t sag or settle over time .
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Old 01-17-2021, 02:07 PM
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Besides insulation, the common items people do to lower energy costs are switching to LED bulbs, instant hot water tanks, heat exchangers in HVAC applications.

Every house if different, and your mileage may vary as payback calculations have many variables.

Your place is newer, looks to be mostly finished space and you have higher end finishes throughout, so tearing anything out to put something in, may stretch your ROI.

It all worth investigating.

My place is similar to yours (but I have a 2 story) and have done a few things (blown in more insulation into the attic space (easy on homes like yours and mine where the roof pitch and soffits allows for ample air above that insulated space), have installed higher efficiency HVAC system (which need to be upgraded and replaced anyways) and decided to go to a high efficiency/fast recovery hot water heater system while we had "everything apart" in replacing the furnaces.

I don't know if I would have done everything all at once like I did, but my heating and utility bill (and energy consumption) is HALF of what it was before the work.

ROI in my case is, nevertheless, is still over 10 years.
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Old 01-17-2021, 02:22 PM
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I'm a fan of the HRV units. I'm not sure what the real world ROI is.

Other than saving energy on cold incoming air, they give you more control over air exchange rates and humidity levels.
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Old 01-17-2021, 02:38 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Dean2 View Post
They can actually re-insulate your walls much easier and cheaper than tearing out the drywall. Options include spray in foam or cellulose, adding insulation on the outside etc and a bunch of other options. We had the external clad job done on a house in GP because the walls were only 2x4.

Twisted, to me ICF is the rigid insulation that goes into making an insulated type foundation. We have that on this house and the previous one. Are you talking just using the board to the rafters or actually using the insulated concrete and board all the way to the rafters, for the walls??
I used Superform ICF, made right in Pincher Creek. I actually did the drywall in their offices when they expanded back in 2005? Anyway, know the owners. It's a bit more then some of the other brands, but having worked with a couple of the others, my personal opinion is it is a better product. I did the blocks with a 6" wide concrete pour for my first two houses, but the one I am in now I over-built footing and went to 8", because I did it myself and the cost difference was not prohibitive. And so far, after 12 years, I have one tiny settling crack in the whole house.

Anyway, yes, I would go right to the rafters with this, then put 24" of blow in on top. You could probably heat the whole house with a candle at -40 C....

Check out the web page. It was really interesting seeing how it is made. They designed all the forms themselves, and they were built by some Swiss company if I remember correctly. Very precision, good product. Also one of the great advantages is tremendous sound proofing. You don't hear traffic or the neighbors kids hollering or dog barking. And they can withstand a tornado apparently.

https://www.superformicf.com/
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Old 01-17-2021, 02:59 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Dean2 View Post
When I first read your comment it said "I love in an old house and the floor is cold" so I was thinking the easy fix would be to not do it on the floor or at least make sure she was on the bottom.


To answer your question, you can have insulation added to the outside of the house and then sided over, you can get spray in insulation sprayed into the walls and you can get cellulose sprayed in too, all without removing the drywall. The last two you will need to patch the holes they used to spray into.
thx for the laugh....
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Old 01-17-2021, 03:20 PM
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i need to insulate my master bathroom better. the floor is cold in the winter and the wall as well. it is above my garage so not sure how to go about that.
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Old 01-17-2021, 04:10 PM
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kind of related

I was talking to Direct Energy *puke* the other day, I have been on a contract for $3.99/Kwh which ends in March and goes to $6.99.

I said that Nat Gas is so cheap I would love to get off the grid completely, and run my 17Kw nat gas generator 24/7. I heat my house and 2000 sf shop to 18c all winter, gas is never much more than $100.

I m still thinking about it. I should disco the meter for a month and just how much it runs. With cold weather coming up it would be a good measure of cost. The other thing to consider, is how long would it take at $300/month for power to pay for a new generator if/when this one fails?

Distribution fees and taxes are just ridiculous.

I almost bet the generator would run on $100 a month.
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Old 01-17-2021, 04:57 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Dean2 View Post
So was looking at the gas bill yesterday and gas consumption, which isn't a large part of the overall gas bill, is running at about 1/3 what it was last year, for the months of Nov and Dec. In mid Oct we had additional Cellulose insulation sprayed into the attic of the house and the attached garage. The house is now 12 years old and the original insulation had settled some, plus the garage had next to none, which I didn't know until we were replacing a couple of roof vents in early October.

I know it has been warmer this year for Nov and Dec than it was the previous two years, and the actual dollar savings is not truly huge, but I was quite impressed that the extra insulation made such a difference. Total job was about $3,000 for 3700 sq ft of attic space so it will take quite a while to recover the cost in savings, but the other bonus is the house furnace and the one in the garage come on far less often.

Curious what upgrades others have done that have provided a large improvement in usability, cost savings etc. Looking for ideas for the coming year.
Biggest thing is tightening up the house. Any hole in the buildings envelope will add to energy loss. Sealing those holes will reduce the transfer of air from conditioned space (inside) to the unconditioned space (outside). Power outlets, light fixtures and faucets on exterior walls contribute to quite a bit of air leakage.

I would get a blower door test on your house to see how sealed the building envelope is. That would give you a place to start. They can walk around the house with thermal imaging when doing the blower door test and see where the leaks are giving you an idea. No point replacing a window when the leak is coming from the door frame.
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Old 01-17-2021, 05:02 PM
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Tape plastic over your windows in the winter! Yikes they gotta be really drafty

Some people like the instant hot water heaters. Only heat it when you need it. Geo thermal and or heat pumps?

Upgrading insulation as well. We have 2x6 walls in our barn with r60 in ceiling and it stays above freezing in the mild winters we’re having. It sits at +5. Not sure what it would be at if it was r40 in the ceiling which I believe is standard in our area.

Last edited by Jerry D; 01-17-2021 at 05:22 PM.
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Old 01-17-2021, 05:19 PM
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Switch over to electric heat and remove the gas meter, then your not paying all those extra fees twice. This approach would be a number game for sure. Not even sure they would let you disconnect the gas. Could be worth looking into. You would only pay one carbon tax. Lol
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Old 01-17-2021, 06:17 PM
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Switch over to electric heat and remove the gas meter, then your not paying all those extra fees twice. This approach would be a number game for sure. Not even sure they would let you disconnect the gas. Could be worth looking into. You would only pay one carbon tax. Lol
It would be interesting to see if going all electric would save you any $$ in the long run.

For me, the fact we have -40°c winters and the possibility of power outages in those temperatures is why i have a gas fireplace and gas stove and would never go full on electric.
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Old 01-17-2021, 07:17 PM
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Originally Posted by fordtruckin View Post
Biggest thing is tightening up the house. Any hole in the buildings envelope will add to energy loss. Sealing those holes will reduce the transfer of air from conditioned space (inside) to the unconditioned space (outside). Power outlets, light fixtures and faucets on exterior walls contribute to quite a bit of air leakage.

I would get a blower door test on your house to see how sealed the building envelope is. That would give you a place to start. They can walk around the house with thermal imaging when doing the blower door test and see where the leaks are giving you an idea. No point replacing a window when the leak is coming from the door frame.
Absolutely correct. When I built mine, I was very very particular doing the vapor barrier. Sealed all joints on sill plates, double studs, around Windows and doors with generous application of acoustic seal, (monkey poo), then spray foamed around all wires and stacks to attic, and made sure all my poly had a good lap and taped properly. Those details make a huge difference. Also make sure your latch set on doors is tight, so it compresses, but doesn't over compress, the weather strip.

And smack your dog for pawing to be let in and ruining the weather stripping too.

Stupid dog.
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Old 01-17-2021, 07:59 PM
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Only one person in this thread mentioned ROI.

If the rest of you actually do the numbers, you will find that you may not live long enough to get your money back on many of these upgrades.

Just sayin...

With regard to "tightening up the house"...yes, to a point....then people crank the windows open to get some fresh air
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Old 01-17-2021, 08:22 PM
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Originally Posted by flyrodfisher View Post
Only one person in this thread mentioned ROI.

If the rest of you actually do the numbers, you will find that you may not live long enough to get your money back on many of these upgrades.

Just sayin...

With regard to "tightening up the house"...yes, to a point....then people crank the windows open to get some fresh air
It does take a while to get ROI, sometimes never. But what you get is a comfortable house to live in without cold and drafty spots and cold floors to step on. That's worth something.
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Old 01-17-2021, 08:34 PM
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In older 2x4 wall houses. Plugs and switches on outside walls will leak a lot of cold air.
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Old 01-17-2021, 08:45 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Twisted Canuck View Post
It does take a while to get ROI, sometimes never. But what you get is a comfortable house to live in without cold and drafty spots and cold floors to step on. That's worth something.
The numbers are tough to justify replacements that are not required. If you are replacing a furnace or HWT anyways it might make sense to get the highest efficiency models available, same goes for appliances. If you tighten up the envelope by just improving weatherstripping, adding gaskets to exterior electrical boxes, shutting off lights when you leave the room, you will go a long way to a lower bill. Make sure your big leakers are done first, this might mean new window gaskets or adjusting locksets so that the window or door closes completely.

Insulating an attic can have a profound impact esp on an older home and it's dead easy. Our home (circa 1980) had terrible blow-in insulation. Took half a day but once the new stops are nailed in, it took no time to place a bunch more F/G batts...used a 3' stick with 2 nails in the end to pick and place each batt. Make sure to weatherstrip the hatch and nail a batt or two onto it.

A smart thermostat is a cheap, easy fix and it can help manage temps if the house is unoccupied for long periods.

Teaching teenagers how to close a door or take a shorter shower is a huge help but may be more frustrating than paying the huge gas bill...your experiences may vary.

Zeke

Last edited by big zeke; 01-17-2021 at 08:57 PM.
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Old 01-19-2021, 04:15 PM
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This has been a very interesting thread. Thanks all for the info provided. Water tank, furnace, ac and all appliances are already high efficiency. Water heater runs the in floor heat in the basement as well as providing hot water. May try the blower/envelope test to see if there are any major leaks. We lived in one house that was actually too air tight. Ended up needing to have some work done to fix that issue.

This house doesn't have that problem but it also now has pretty low utility Bill's for the size of house. To me it is like EZM said, it is more about having a comfortable house than ROI. Problem with trying to save money on utilities is the water, electrical or gas cost are such a small part of the total bill the only way to change it much and get any return would be to figure out how to get off the grid for electricity and gas at least. Outside of that you still have the huge levies, distribution fees etc.
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