Cooling Your Home When You Have Pets

You may not realize that owning pets can actually make it a little harder for you to keep your home at a cooler temperature without paying more than you should have to for your energy expenses. However, having animals inside of your home can actually play a role in cooling your home efficiently. Therefore, if you are a pet owner then you are going to want to consider following some of these tips during the summer months so you don't have trouble keeping the home cool and so you don't spend more than you should in order to do so.

Vacuum and sweep often

When you have pets you should vacuum and sweep the floors often. This will help prevent fur from going straight to the air conditioner's filter. It also prevents some of that hair from actually making its way all the way through the system. Not only will this make things harder on the unit, but it will also increase the likeliness of those with allergies having flare ups.

Close off the doggy door

If you have a doggy door then you know how convenient it is. It allows your dog to come and go as they please, so you don't have to keep getting up to let them out. The problem is when you allow the doggy door to be used during the summer months, it lets the cool air out and the hot air in. This is why you should close it off for the summer. You can easily close it off by installing a latch. However, if there is still air coming in from the border of the door, then you may want to temporarily put a piece of material completely over the door. You can use anything from a piece of cardboard to a piece of plywood. Whatever you choose to use, make sure it can easily be removed when the temperature gets cooler and you want the dog to have access to the doggy door again.

Tint the windows for the cats

If you have cats that like to mess up your blinds or curtains so they can sunbathe in your window sill then they can be letting a lot of heat in through the windows. Also, if you have a cat that is determined to do this, then keeping them out of the window sill can be a fulltime job. You can fix this issue by having tint put on the outside of the windows. The tint cuts down the heat that comes through the windows significantly and you'll even be able to enjoy having your blinds open once you have this done.

Contact an air condition contractor for more help.