It is a conundrum; you love it when your home is cozy and warm in winter, but you do not love the heating bill. Heating services from an HVAC contractor can help. They can provide some solutions that will help you keep the house cozy when you are home and reduce your heating bills when you are away. Here are a few other options that can help keep your home toasty without jacking up your heating bill.

Pellet Stoves

​Pellet stoves throw off a ton of heat. Most homes that are one level and which place the pellet stove in the most central part of the home often find that the pellet stove heats almost the entire house. The initial cost of a pellet stove may throw you for a loop, but these stoves definitely pay for themselves within a couple winters because you are not running your home's actual furnace. If you have a second level to your home, you can set the thermostat to a lower temperature to heat the upper part of your home and just close all of the downstairs vents. Doing so will channel more heat upward to the second floor while the first floor is warmed by the pellet stove.

Running All Appliances in the Evening Hours

​It may be tempting to run the dishwasher in the morning before work or the laundry machines during the day, but you could actually benefit more from running all of these appliances in the evening. A stove, a washer, a dryer, and a dishwasher all exude and radiate heat, which tends to make your house a lot warmer than you might expect. You may have noticed this when you use your stove to cook dinner in the summertime. When you choose to run all of these appliances in the evening, you will dramatically heat up your home for a few hours, which is perfect. Then your furnace does not have to work as hard, and you can still have the cozy warmth that you crave. Since you would probably run all of these appliances for one reason or another, it just makes sense to run them at this time of day to get both the housework done and get the extra warmth.

​The Faux Fireplace/Entertainment Center

​You may have seen these in stores or ads. They are electric fireplaces that exude warmth and reflect realistic flames in the "hearth." They double as entertainment centers, which offers you places to place your flat screen TV and accompanying devices. Some models even offer cabinet space for your movie collection or to display collectibles. 

For more information, talk to local heating services.