How to Keep Your Home Cool and Dry in the Summer Months

Keep Your Home Cool and Dry, This Summer

Well, get ready for it. Here it comes. The humidity, and the heat.

After the past few days, this could be an indication that we are headed into a hot humid spring and summer. Regardless, of whether we are or not, we should be ready it, and get our houses ready for it.

How Can You Reduce Heat and Humidity in Your Home?

One way to keep your house cool is to keep the humidity level below 60%. If it does, mold could start developing. If you’ve got issues, you’ll begin to see and feel it on paper products, like books, photos and posters, just to name a few. As it worsens, your clothes and furniture will feel moist. You could see mold start creeping up the wall, from the floor, where the air is the heaviest and contains the most water content.

Remember that your concrete basement floor is always colder then the warm moist air around it. Cold air is heavy and warm air is light, which explains why your second floor or attic is always hotter than your basement. When warm air meets cold air it will turn to condensation, resulting in sweat on your cold water supply lines and toilets on the hot, humid days.

Also, if you have a tile floor in the basement it could sweat and create water on the surface. Be careful. It could be slippery. If you don’t remove that moisture out of your basement OR crawlspace, you will get mold. Mold is there before you even see it. It is a health hazard that can cause allergies and illness.

So, How Do You Control the Moisture?

Here are just a few things you can do to improve your living and building health of your home.

1. Get the air moving in your basement or crawl space, and dry it out. Buy a couple of portable fans
   and put one at each end of the basement. Keeping them on low will work fine, unless it’s really humid.
2. If it is really cool or moist in your basement or crawlspace, turn the heat on a little bit to equalize the
   temperature within the house.
3. Turn on the furnace fans to draw some of the cold air out of the basement, to the upstairs. This helps limit the use of more expensive air conditioning too.
4. Install a humidex. It’ll cost $500 and it controls the humidity in your home. It acts just like a dehumidifier, but costs less to operate and you won’t have to empty the holding container.
5. Buy an energy star rated dehumidifier and hook it up to a floor drain.
6. Open basement windows a window little bit to allow for fresh air. Just remember to close them to avoid accidental flooding.
7. If it gets warm enough to turn on the air conditioner, it’ll cost you a little more but it will cool your home and remove a lot of the moisture out of the air.

 

Other Things to Consider to Keep Your Home Cool

1. Make sure your attic/roof has adequate ventilation.
2. If you are going to re-shingle, your roof, choose a lighter colour that absorbs less heat.
3. Plant trees and plants to block the hot, summer sun. It’ll provide outdoor shade, and keep your home cooler on the inside.
4. Limit your use of incandescent lighting because most of the energy used is wasted in heat. Use care with CFL bulbs though. They are toxic when they break.
5. Shade your air conditioner to keep the hot sun off it. This can increase your units efficiency, but be careful not to restrict airflow, or you may end up with problems.
6. Close your windows and window coverings during the day.
7. Open your blinds and windows during the cool of the evening. Try to get a cross breeze going.
8. Place a fan near the window, rather than in the window. Watch for rain, because the fan may draw the rain
   into the house.

These are just a few things to do that will help you stay cool.

When you are ready to sell your home or buy one, bring me a long and I will give you some great tips as to how to keep your home cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter.

I would love the opportunity to help you or your referrals out.