apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

I find this post out of touch with what is going on-
http://money.cnn.com/2008/08/15/news/economy/home_heating/

haven't turned it on yet

Erm.... when I'm cold? I use a tiny space heater at night after a few nights of waking up cold. Sometimes I'll pop on the heat for 5 minutes right before I shower in the morning if it's particularly chilly. Being in an apartment, it doesn't take much energy to heat (assuming I don't leave my chimney flue open, oops!) Socks work best. yay!

Whenever it gets cold. It was actually surprisingly chilly for us this morning too, but it was in the upper 50s, not the 30s! I'd be turning on my heater for sure!

I know my dad doesn't turn the heat on until December. He also wears a jacket and sneakers inside ALL the time.
As a kid, I remember sneaking downstairs at night in the fall and turning up the thermostat, just so I could go to sleep!

There was also one winter when I lived in the North End and our heat suddenly stopped working. Myself and my two roommates were too lazy (but not me, I was just too busy and rarely home except for sleeping :)) to figure out what happened or get someone to fix it, so we went a couple months with no heat. Yeah, college students are dumb. :P
I'd sleep with three or four candles lit in my room (read: ALSO DUMB! DO NOT EVER DO THAT!), and it actually did a pretty good job of keeping my room warm at night. And luckily, I didn't burn the apartment down!
Oh, and I eventually took the time to investigate our gas heater in the closet... the pilot light went out, that was all. Damn lazy college kids. ;)

I now live in LA, and I never ever turn the heat on. If it's "cold" (you know, like 60 degrees :P) I wrap up in a blanket and drink lots of tea and coffee.

I think 55 is about my lower limit for how cold I'm willing to let it get int he house! So far we've only dipped as low as 59 in the living room (according to our digital thermostat). I try to open all the blinds before leaving for work in hopes that we'll get a bit of solar warmth. I also went around this weekend and made sure to close all the storm windows and put out the "door snake" for our front porch door.

LoriSF, how is that out of touch. if this is a BOSTON poster, and he said it was in the 30's when he awoke, i would hardly call that out of touch.
I'm in philly, so not as cold as Boston (ever), but last night i had to close my windows to sleep. I can't believe its already time to close my windows again!
I'd say i'll let the heat click on when the place gets below 45 or 50.

i turn it on as soon as i feel cold, if i'm able. but a lot of times in nyc, the building's super decides when the furnace goes on. i think legally they don't have to turn it on until oct 15, or nov 1...

I don't have an option of when my heat goes on, and I also don't have the option of adjusting the thermostat. I live in a house with four units and the thermostat is in one of the first floor units but ONLY the landlords (who live next door in a separate house) are allowed to adjust it at all. I'm all for conserving energy and money, so I'm pretty happy to just wear a heavey sweatshirt, scarf, and slippers when I'm inside, but I do think it's a little irritating that I can't adjust the temperature in my own apartment.

I mean, sometimes the heat is on and it's WAY too hot because we're on the second floor, you know? When that happens we usually just crack a window to air it out a bit and then the landlords yell at us that we're letting money fly out the windows. It's like, I understand but I'm also slowly roasting and have no choice in the matter...

The management of the building where I live started heating up the place this past Monday.

I usually like a chilly apartment and just layer up with clothes so I don't turn on the heat until it gets too cold for my taste. Although 30 degrees is pretty cold!

I live in a charming historic brownstone in the South End, which, lovely as it is, doesn't have heat. Of course the realtor/landlord neglected to tell us this when we moved in, and we were sweating when we viewed the apartment in June, so we didn't think to ask.

So, for us, there is no heat to turn on. We got a couple of space heaters that we only use when it is absolutely freezing, and even then, we only use them in the mornings when we're getting ready for work. The rest of the time, we've used our "misfortune" as an excuse for putting on flannel pajamas, drinking hot tea, and cuddling under hand-knit blankets to stay warm. I think it's worked out exceptionally well... and we never seem to be cold, except for the tips of our noses!

I have the thermostat set on 65, and mine came on by itself this weekend (for the first time this year) while we were lying on the couch watching scary movies and completely took us off guard. It's very loud when it starts up (it "bubbles" up all of the apartment walls) and it came on right at a creepy part which made us both jump and then start laughing.

It stayed on all Saturday night and then last night I heard it come on for a little bit also.

I very rarely ever turn on the heat. My home is well insulated and my climate is Mediterranean, so it isn't really very necessary. I wear sweaters and down-filled booties around the house, drink tea, use lap robes, and if it really gets chilly, use a couple of hot water bottles. My laptop computer is usually on my lap and it throws off a lot of heat as well.

If I lived someplace cold, I'd turn the heat on when none of the above were cutting it. I like saving $$ and energy, but I'm not interested in being miserable.

Your house doesn't have heat?? Is that even legal?

We live in a new apartment so I am waiting to see how bad it will get. I have a feeling that several of our windows and our fireplace will be quite drafty.

I know its time to turn the heat on when my kitty tries to sleep under the covers. When its too cold for her, its too cold for me!

I'm almost always cold (probably because I have hypothyroidism), so I tend to turn the heat on fairly early in the year. I've already had it on a few times so far, starting in late September. I guess it doesn't help that the entire west wall of my apartment is windows, so the heat escapes easily.

Oops, I mean 60. I think when it gets below that it turns itself on.

I'd like to know what your point is, LoriSF?

My answer has changed since I moved into a building where heat is included, yeah I turned it on last week and this morning when I woke up at 5 way too hot, instead of turning down the heat (which I would have had to get out of bed to do), I just opened the window. Yes bad for the enviroment, but awesome for me. At my last place when I had to pay for it, I wouldn't turn it on until December/January...

I've been tempted a few times in the last week (I'm in CT), but I've made do with a fire in the fireplace one evening, and the heat lamp in the bathroom a couple mornings (my thermostat is set to its lowest--50--and so far the inside temp has gone down to 56). Luckily my cats want to stay warm, too, and sit on my lap.

I pulled out the down filler for my duvet this weekend. Perfect for sleeping alone on chilly nights, but it was too much when my partner stayed last night night. We roasted! He's a human radiator, but I'll trade his trade body heat for feather heat any day of the week. :-)

Lostinprojection: Maybe I am reading this wrong... your apartment is unheated?? By law, your landlord must provide heat!

"The landlord must provide a heating system in good working order. The landlord must pay for the heat, unless your lease requires you to pay for it. From September 16 to June 14, every room must be heated to at least 68º F between 7:00 AM and 11 PM, and at least 64º F at all other hours. During the heating season, the maximum heat allowable in the apartment is 78º F."

http://www.mass.gov/?pageID=ocaterminal&L=4&L0=Home&L1=Consumer&L2=Housing Information&L3=Tenant %26 Landlord&sid=Eoca&b=terminalcontent&f=tenants_rights_and_responsibilities&csid=Eoca

I live in the Pacific Northwest and haven't had to turn my heat on just yet. We've had a few chilly nights recently, but nothing throwing on an extra blanket or two can't solve. When temperatures start dipping down, my husband and I usually will turn on the heat for a bit to get comfortable and then shut it off and throw on some sweaters, socks, and a blanket. Makes for a cozy night at home. Saves on heating bills, too. Since heat rises and our bedroom is on the second floor, we don't have to worry about running our heater all night since we get heat that's carried up from earlier activities downstairs.

I will make exceptions in the bathroom. There is very little that's less pleasant than showering in a cold space. We have a small space heater that I use every morning. Love the thing and won't give it up. :)

*that's less UNpleasant. oops.

I don't turn the heat on unless I'm in bed sick and it's under 40 degrees outside.

I do bake potroasts or muffins in the oven to warm up the apartment, I make big pots of soup and boil my tea in a kettle on the stove - I have a small spaceheater with a timer that I drag into the bedroom to take the chill off in the mornings before I go to work or warm up the room in the evenings before bed.

I wear fleecy sweats and shirts, socks and slippers around the apartment - I keep throws and blankets around the place to snuggle under - and I take nice warm showers and baths or a swim in the pool or a dip in the jacuzzi downstairs to warm up.

The best thing about living in a 192Os apartment building is steam heat, which keeps everything comfortable all the time without the up-&-down cycling that comes with forced air. The other good thing about steam heat is that it's basically free: I don't pay for it, my landlord does. On the other hand, he doesn't turn it on till November 1, no matter how cold it gets. It's a tradeoff.

Anyway, I deal with the chill by using a ton of vintage woolen blankets at night, and by wearing cashmere as the first layer. People think that you have to dry clean cashmere or hand wash it, but that's only true when you're planning on wearing it on the outside, and as soon as one of my sweaters gets a moth hole or a big spaghetti sauce stain down the front, it goes straight into the wash on Hot, from which it comes out clean, tight & extra fuzzy--perfect for damp, cold weather. One of those babies under a dress shirt--or three, if it's the bottom of January--and the actual room temperature becomes pretty much a non-issue.

This post is very relevant.

I am just as angry as the next person about increased costs (bailout too) being passed on to we the people so e-mails have been sent and voice mails have been left for my congress people and senators. They do work for us afterall and yes, I will continue to be a squeaky wheel.

In the meantime, I'm going to do what my parents, my grand parents and great grandparents did in a negative economy: scale back on the "nice tos"-lattes, eating out,etc. so I can pay for "the need tos" like gasoline, heat groceries.

Yes, it sucks but we are still very fortunate to have far more available to us than many people in the world.

i live in michigan and I refuse to turn it on until November 1. I think of it as an endurance test. :)

I prefer to keep the heat low because we have so little cold weather here in coastal TX, so few opportunities to drink lots of hot tea, bake cookies, wear my fuzzy zippy, etc. My husband will turn it up to 75-80 in mornings, if I let him... guess he's a tropical bird. I try to keep it around 70.

Although we have plenty of blankets, it has to be at 65 at night. Any colder than that, and the cats will wake us up with their burrowing, like mally's. One night I woke up when one of them was circling round and round, sort of trying to drill himself into this tiny space between me and my husband.

Haven't had to turn it on yet this year, but last night, Callisto was kneading my shins. (No idea why she likes to perch there.) So the cat thermometer is getting lower. (Finally. I know you northerers are wincing, but it's so bloody hot most of our year.)

good idea about reclaiming the cashmere, magnaverde! the stuff is too precious to toss.

I refuse to turn my heat on, too. It's small electric heaters and cozy pajamas in the evenings for me. I use a small box heater in the mornings, too, to break the chill. I keep the temp between 60-65 degrees.

NEVER!

i throw open the windows and enjoy the winter chill. i love freezing cold weather.

In Tucson, my whole-house-fan runs at night to cool the house down from (still) above 90 degree temperatures. Cooling is ready to run from March until November. My heater goes on for January in most years, but only if I feel rich and self-indulgent.

Started last week-end. Montreal weather obliges...

I haven't turned on the heat yet (Boston), and I still have a few windows open all the time, as in 24/7. I don't think the temperature has dropped below the mid 40s yet, so I might not turn on the heat until just after Halloween.

We have an annual contest to see how long we can hold out before turning the heat on! Fleece socks, wool sweaters and down blankets may get us to the 1st of December...but 32 degrees this morning did make for a cold bathroom.

We both get cold easily, so we've already turned it on a few times. The big thing is first thing in the morning to take the chill off.

turn the heat on, i'm still wearing shorts. yeah it's been a bit chilly here in northern indiana, but i'm a cold weather kind of guy.

once it gets cold enough out we turn the heat on when internal temp is around 65 or so. We get a lot of sun so it stay pretty warm on it's own.

Worst was up north in michigan at a ski cabin and the heat went out i think it was 40 degrees inside when we woke up. i slept in my ski gear.

I'm also from Montreal and we started at the beggining of this week... it gets in the 30s (and lower) during the night so we don't have much choice.

I've had my furnace running on a less than regular basis since labour day weekend!
We had a bit of an Indian Summer though, so it's warmed up since then, but seriously... it was chilly at the beginning of Sept!
My downstairs neighbour complains about the chill and I hate turning the heat up for her. I still try and keep it about 18 degrees (C) instead of 22... I wish I could tell her to just move out and not live in a basement if she doesn't like the cold!

Grrr

If your apartment in boston was in the 30s (unclear from the post whether that was just the temp outdoors, or also indoors), you have a severe insulation problem, and are going to be very unhappy in the pocket-book a few weeks from now.

Our heat is still off, and we know we have crap insulation (just had an energy audit to figure out how to fix that) but even so, the house hasn't yet dropped below 58 this fall. Typically, it's around 60 in the early mornings these days, rising as the sun warms it, to cool in the evening and night.

This is an excellent time to do a lot of baking, which is what I did last night. :)

We turned on the heat this weekend. Partly because it was cold and rainy and the house just felt damp. We had been sleeping with the windows open until then, however. We have radiators, so it's good to run them on low for a few days so that the steaming and clanking can be adjusted out before the real cold sets in.

lostinprojection - call the city about the heat situation - my understanding is that you can withhold rent for days when there is no heat in the apartment

From the city of Boston website (sorry I closed the tab before copying the link):
If you are a tenant, and the heat isn't working, or doesn't heat to 68° (day) or 64° (night), call the City of Boston Inspectional Services Department at 617-635-5322. The City also has a 24-hour 'No Heat' response team that you can contact at 617-635-4500.

Brrrrr...it sure is getting very chilly up here in VT (I've had to scrape frost off my windshield every morning this week) but I just can't bring myself to turn on the heat just yet. I'm into the multi-layered look for the moment: socks, fleece, down. I may have to stoke up the woodstove this weekend, though. Grrrr.

NO heat in your South End apartment?? Yikes!!

I wait until the first frost to turn it on...which is usually sometime in November.

First, what is Lori or whatever she goes by posting that this blog is out of touch by posing a question? Yes, I went to your cnn link....and??? your point?

I too lived in the south end and I understand the no heat thing...I had cheap...very cheap rent. Sometimes that is the "deal" in return for cheap rent. This was in 1987 when I had a 3 bedroom brownstone for $500 a month. So it was "as is" in other words. I realize this is not legal but it worked for me at that time being a starving artist. I do not think they can really call the city and complain when they knew it did not have heat and that they had to provide it....I mean they can but that will just piss off the landlord and he will in turn raise the rent or make your life miserable in some way. Just heat it yourself if the rent is good otherwise call 1010 mass ave inspectional services. I did not make waves so I lived very cheap in a great place for 10 years and saved a ton of money to by my house.

And to answer the question, I now own in a 1800's restored firehouse with oil heat. We are waiting until Oct 15 to turn the system on it has staved us $1000's of dollars so far.

My house has a wood burning stove, so while I haven't actually turned the heating on yet I'm still staying toasty. I'm a huge baby when it comes to even the slightest chill, and NY is getting increasingly cold.

I don't see anything wrong with turning your heat on a little bit if you're freezing. I live in an apartment building where the furnace comes on when the temperature outside stays below a certain point for a certain length of time, but I control my thermostat... and really, if you're that cold, raise the thermostat by a few degrees and suck it up and pay the bill. Maybe heating is just cheaper here, but I've never felt that heating my home to a liveable degree has been an exorbitant expense. And if you're reasonable about your temperature, it's not that bad for the environment. Even one or two degrees makes all the difference sometimes. And when I get home from my office which is kept freezing cold, it's nice to have my apartment at a comfortable temperature.

I used to live in an apartment that "had" heat, but really didn't - it was on the third floor of a house, and the tenants on the first floor controlled the heat. Unless they had it at sauna temperatures in their apartment, I didn't get any heat. My landlord? Didn't care, just told me to ask the people downstairs to turn it up. I'm not about to make them live in tropical heat, so I dealt with it. Space heaters, candles, fuzzy blankets, etc.

If I'm wearing socks, long pants, and long sleeves...and I'm still cold, I'll consider it. If a blanket or hot tea (on top/with the above) doesn't help, then I will turn it on.

I don't care what the calendar or the thermostat says. If I'm cold, I'm cold!

i actually turned mine on the other night b/c i had left the windows open & when i got home it was cold. so, i turned it on for a few minutes. i'm glad i did b/c i discovered it doesn't work. it's an old place so all of the heat are those wall grill things. i've used the one in the bathroom after a shower.

however, i prefer to use my edenpur space heater b/c it's safe, clean, & uses low energy.

i'm so glad i moved from my drafty, trendy, downtown, $250 a month heating apt to my country, studio, $25 a month place. :)

I completely agree with Mrs.Mack just above me - if a sweatshirt and sweatpants s till doesn't cut it, time to turn the heat on.
I'm in NYC, and we used to live in a 6th floor walk up, we didn't turn the heat on once the whole winter, actually we had to keep the AC blasting 24/7 (we didnt pay for utilities) because it was a sauna with all the steam coming through our pipes! It was awful. Now that we've moved, we turned it on less than a dozen times this last winter.

if i start thinking how comfy it would be to wear a ski mask - that's a sign it's time to turn on the heat.

We have an eight month old, so we turned it on this weekend, in Philly. It's been getting pertty cold at night. During the day I just layer us both up.

I'm another NYCer waiting for the landlord to turn on the heat. It's gotten colder earlier than usual here, and my new apartment is ground floor, over the basement. I'm layered up and wrapped in blankets, but dang, it's cold in here!

Ha! I answered this already on Boston.com because I was shocked that someone had their heat at 68 already. It hasn't been THAT cold outside!

I try to wait until Nov 15, but I usually don't make it that long. I keep it at 60-62 because that's what I can afford. If I'm moving around cooking or cleaning that's quite comfortable. If I'm sitting still I have a very lightweight down "sweater" that I wear that keeps me very warm.

We try to wait as long as possible in chilly Upstate NY. It becomes a competition with our neighbors who can keep it off longer. We have all new windows so we usually win! To keep warm on those chilly nights we just layer the blankets and cuddle up closer. I sleep better in a cool room, so I like the brisk air.

Umm January? Thats about when it gets really cold in Texas. Really cold for Texas that is. It usually doesnt ice until Jan or Feb and thats the real cold down here. I remember moving out of a college apt after finals in mid-December a couple years ago wearing short and a tank top and breaking a sweat moving things down 3 stories. We try to just wear sweats and stuff as long as we can indoors. The ac is what we MUST have here (=

i got to thinking about a winter that i didn't have heat, other than putting an electric one right next to me. i learned to be creative to keep warm. i still try to be as conservative as i can comfortably get away with so i'm not throwing money out the window. of course you should put weatherproofing shrinkwrap plastic on any drafty windows. makes a HUGE difference. otherwise...doing dishes, or taking showers and baths have a lasting warmth effect. drinking a cup of hot tea or soup, warming you from the inside helps too. always wearing a soft scarf and hat, even inside..is cozy and makes a big difference. i always have a throw blanket on the sofa. and of course it helps that the pets want to be right beside me. they are great heat sources! all these easy little things can help postpone turning on the heat and help save money.

I can't control my heat. They turn the radiators on in my building on November 1st and leave them on until March 30. I live on the 4th floor and I have to let air out every couple hours or else they won't work. :\ I bought a thermometer last year and my apartment in January is usually around 50-55 degrees because my radiators never stay on for more than 2-3 hours max. So much for the state law saying temps have to be above 68 degrees.

My house was a gut renovation, so everything is pretty new. While I haven't insulated the attic yet, the house is pretty stable temperature-wise. My bathroom floor is heated (for anyone who EVER retiles, spend the $250 and get the tile floor heated, I wish I could hand out flyers at tile stores). For 3-4 cents a day I completely eliminate needing the heat turned on in the bathroom at all. It's so nice to walk onto a warm floor in the morning.

As far as my windows, I went with the super-duper argon-filled ones, which completely eliminate allowing the sun to warm the room (oops) but I guess it's better for cooling in the summer.

Otherwise, down comforter, college sweatshirts and a movie-night blanket do the trick.

Thanks for everyone's concern/interest in my situation! My boyfriend and I are aware of the legal issue surrounding having no heat... and although our rent isn't cheap enough to "let it slide," we have, because of our awful realty company, who tried to evict us because they lost our rent check once. Our kind landlord bought us individual space heaters, and they can crank it out, but because our apartment is so tiny, we inevitably bump into them and singe our skin, our worry about melting the acrylic rug that came with the apartment. *Sigh* City living as a college student.

Really, though--what did people do before indoor heating? Are we all babies because we can't just suck it up and pile on the layers? My grandparents seem to have turned out just fine, and they never had indoor heating...or cooling...and did without plumbing for a while, yikes!

@lostinprojection-- See http://www.law.harvard.edu/academics/clinical/lsc/help/index.htm . They're doing pro-bono work for other tenants stuck without heat in Boston, it's worth looking into. (and before indoor heating they had fires. Later, bedcurtains helped with the chill.)

@LoriSF -- Huh? Your link just talks about the high cost of oil and people feeling the pinch. It seems to me that makes the poll all the MORE relevant, not "out of touch". I don't understand what you're getting at. Please clarify?