Cold Snap Highlights Where Minnesotans Are Losing Money

Growing up, I often heard phrases like 'Were you born in a barn?" or my dad's favorite, "I'm not paying to heat the outdoors, shut the door". Running in and out to bring in groceries, letting the dog out, or if you've got kids, you know how much of a battle it can be to maintain the comfort in your home during late fall and through the winter. I recently saw a graphic online that highlighted the 3 areas of your house where you are most likely throwing money away.

Keeping Heat In Your House Versus Losing It Outside

I don't know about you, but I haven't found any extra growing on trees. Here are the 3 areas you should look at before it gets too cold to save money on your heating bills this winter.

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There are some things that you can do, outside of replacing them, as that can be expensive. One thing that many homeowners are doing right now is buying the plastic film that you can stick around your window on the inside of your house, and then blow-dry to shrink around the frame. This is a budget-friendly option for the winter months, allowing the heat to stay in your home rather than leaking out the window.

If you discover your attic to be lacking insulation, even older homes might not have the recommended insulation, and you might want to remedy the situation. You can either go to the hardware store and pick up loose fill or another form of insulation and add that to your attic, or in some cases, you'll want to hire someone/a business to do this, as accessing your attic might be difficult, and having a professional handling the itchy insulation sounds like a better idea to me.

Owning A Home Can Be Expensive, But Not Everything Needs To Be A 'Job'

Homeowners will tell you it's expensive to maintain a home properly, but you don't need to hire someone every time you need something done. I'm on house number 3, and each one I've done some DIY in, and from my perspective, it's more of a comfort-level thing to do a job myself versus hiring someone to do it.

While you might not be comfortable aligning your door or going up into the attic, you can probably handle a blow dryer if you're kids can help put up the plastic on the windows. I still have fun memories helping my dad out with the window plastic when I was a kid.