Why Your Home Is 72° but Feels Awful!

[00:00:00]Thank you to the sponsor of this video, Daikin. If I were to pick out one thing that I think a lot of homeowners don't think about enough, that is humidity.

[00:00:09]And the reason I think it's such an important thing is humidity affects more than you know. It affects not just, you know, the air you breathe, but it affects your comfort and it affects the performance of your home and it affects things you are un- unforeseen, right?

[00:00:23]Way more than even temperature does, right? It affects your comfort way more than you know. And if we were to just focus on comfort for a moment, and I'll get to those other items in just a moment, but I think that a lot of homeowners will focus so much on the performance of an air conditioner. And as time has gone on, folks like you have gotten more and more educated. More and more homeowners and even technicians in our industry are considering humidity when they didn't really consider it at all before. There was always this consensus that the bigger the air conditioner, the faster it will cool my home, and then that quicker it'll turn off, and the more energy I will save, right? And we learned through trial and error over the years that that's not necessarily the right way to to do this, right? We learned that we should probably have systems sized properly, so it removes as much humidity from the space, and long run times are not necessarily a bad thing. In fact, because of the spikes in energy and the constant short cycling, that maybe a longer run time removing more humidity from the space is actually more efficient and more comfortable for you.

[00:01:29]Now, what can you do from a comfort standpoint? Again, we'll get to the rest of the items such as safety and, you know, indoor air quality and unforeseen home envelope type stuff. We'll we'll get to all that in just a second, but just from a comfort standpoint, I think it should be noted that a lot of companies should be looking more at humidity control, and not just the companies themselves, the HVAC technicians and the folks that are taking care of you, but also you. Look at some of the options that are out there. It's not as it used to be of just, you know, going to a local hardware store and buying a, you know, a little roll-around dehumidifier that, you know, may not actually put a big dent in everything or, you know, just simply buying a little tabletop humidifier that there are better options out there. And I think it should be noted that we were a big fan of Daikin at our company. That's the brand we sold, and they're actually the sponsor of today's video. I'm going to talk about some of the options that they have in just a moment, we do, I just wanted to thank them for sponsoring this video and share a little message.

[00:02:31]>> [music] [music] [music] [music] >> So, yes, Daikin can address, you know, adding humidity or removing humidity, right? They have dehumidifiers. If you talk to your local Daikin Comfort Pro, if you go to daikincomfort.com, you'll be able to get connected with one.

[00:03:12]They've got ways to, you know, find a local technician. You just click find a contractor on their website. And so, whether you're removing humidity with dehumidifiers or adding humidity if you're in a drier climate or if it's in the wintertime and you're trying to get a humidifier to add humidity to that home, yes, there's options for that, but they've gone above and beyond that, right? They've got now options with sensors that can sense the humidity.

[00:03:36]They have smart technologies where the systems can coincide with an inverter system and really address the humidity issue while making you as comfortable as possible with that system and saving as much energy as possible. Whether it's their actual home air monitor that can connect with one of their smart thermostats and you know, ramp up or down and even address other things like, you know, the filtration of the air for example. But having all of that in one system and being able to rely on a contractor that knows what they're doing can really address, again, humidity like never before, right? Having that system sized properly, but also work really, really well makes a big difference here.

[00:04:20]Now, that's comfort, right? Now, let's talk real quick about some of the other things that are not necessarily on your front of your brain when you're buying a heating and air system, right? So, let's talk about indoor air quality because obviously there is a range that you want to stay in. You want to stay above 30 or 40% depending on your climate of humidity, relative humidity, and you want to stay below 60. If you can get in that real sweet spot there, you address so many issues, but the big one here, many parts of our country where the humidity does get significantly high in certain parts of the year and air conditioning can make a problem an even bigger problem because the system is just simply not removing enough humidity and having a way to monitor that can play a big role. I would say, even if you're not ready to call a contractor today, I would say get something to at least monitor your humidity levels. I think that goes a long way. I always felt like when I was a contractor going to someone's home and I'm meeting them and they have something that measures these things, I'm already further along than I would have been because I already have a customer that knows what the problems are. They know what needs to be addressed. It's not like, "Oh, you know, I'm having headaches and I'm not really sure why." And I'm always having to have a little detective work to try to figure out where we are going to start there.

[00:05:41]Now, after years of experience, of course, I know where to go, but having a customer, a homeowner that knows things like, "Hey, I had a long span of time where we were staying as high as 70 or 80% of humidity in my home." That's good to know, right? And what do we do about that, right? So, I think just day one, you need to get something that monitors it. I'm going to put down in the description of this video some of my favorite products that monitor that relative humidity among other things.

[00:06:09]You know, there's other measurements that you can get, too. But, definitely having something that monitors just the simple RH will play a big role. What that percentage is in the air. And that, in my opinion, would be the first step to even knowing that that's the problem, right? You don't even know that there is upcoming issues with your comfort or safety or the home envelope itself until you know. You don't know until you know.

[00:06:35]And lastly, when it comes to home envelope, we are seeing today houses get built tighter and tighter. I just had a meeting with someone yesterday where they were talking about the construction of their home and discussing some of the materials that, oh by the way, some of the things they were describing were not even a a possibility when I got into this industry. That some of the technologies that they're using to build the house itself, the outer shell, and the layers that can be added, and the different types of, whether it's flash and batt, right? Or or just simple, you know, spray-in closed-cell insulation.

[00:07:08]You got folks that are insulating the attics now or encapsulating crawl spaces. They're doing all these things that were not even a thing 20, 30, 40 years ago. You know, even homes built today, some of them don't have today's technologies. And now that we do see homes being built way tighter, it becomes a way bigger deal to not just have the air conditioning and heating sized properly for comfort and performance for the home, but what's the thing we've been talking about?

[00:07:38]Humidity. That's the big one we need to make sure because now we've got a house that's so tight that we need to address that. Now, you know, we can talk about other things too with ventilation and making sure that the home has safe air to breathe with VOCs and all those different things. Yes, I agree. Please have ventilation in your home, especially if it's a newer home. Too many homes do not, but humidity. Address that before it's a problem. I think every house, even if it's an older home, should have a way to monitor those humidity levels and that way you know what to do moving forward. or you hire that technician we were talking about before. All that said, thanks for watching. Leave me a comment down below if you think I missed something. If you like this video, I think you'll like this one, too. Hit that subscribe button for more HVAC tips. We'll see you next time.