south florida summer heat

How To Keep Your Home Cool During The Summer Heat?

Summer is here, and so is the Florida heat! As your thermometer rises, your A/C unit begins to work harder and harder just to keep the house cool. This ultimately leads to your energy bill being much higher all Summer long. Interestingly, there’s a number of factors that all work in unison together to affect the internal temperature of your South Florida home.

Your windows and doors play major roles in facilitating the overall temperature of your home. Underperforming standard windows will allow both cold air to leak out and allow for solar heat gain to drive your home’s internal temperature through the roof.

Thankfully, you and your home don’t have to suffer from the summer heat with impact windows and doors!

First, What Is Solar Heat Gain?

Solar heat gain is the amount of heat that gets converted from the sun’s radiation. As the sun’s rays hit windows that energy is mostly absorbed, causing the windows to heat up. This, in turn, allows for that heat to then pass through and into your home which leads to an overall environment. While great for homes that experience freezing winters, this just leads to a sweltering home down here in South Florida. Standard builder’s windows offer little in the way of insulation, causing homes to rise dramatically in temperature over the course of a few hours.

So, What Can You Do To Cool Your Home?

There’s a few tips to consider to keep your South Florida home nice and cool throughout the Summer months. These include:

Keep Your Windows Closed

Your first instinct might be to open your windows and allow that Florida breeze to roll through—don’t! Even if cool air is coming in, so is hot air, as well as other potential dangers such as high humidity levels which can easily reach levels of 70%-90%. Additionally, due to the random nature of Florida’s weather, you can quickly be caught off guard by an unrelenting thunderstorm, allowing heavy rainfall to make its way into your home. Keeping your windows closed will actually lead to cooler temperatures than opening them up.

Utilize Your Window Treatments, Especially When You’re Not Home

While there’s nothing better than natural lighting, there’s certainly a time and a place for it. While some exterior light is nice for your South Florida home, prolonged exposure can lead to some very hot rooms in your home. When a room is not in use, or if you plan on leaving for the day, make sure any blinds or curtains are closed. These will actually do a significant job of stopping solar heat gain from rapidly progressing throughout the day. This will also help your A/C work a bit less to keep your home cool, especially when there’s nobody home.

Replace Your Old Windows For Impact Windows

It may not seem like it, but your windows could actually be playing a major role in your house getting so hot from the summer heat. As mentioned earlier, your windows allow for solar heat gain to transfer that heat into your home. Underperforming windows will do a poor job of insulating the inside of your house, leading to your A/C working overtime.

By installing impact windows, solar heat gain drops dramatically as they’re designed to naturally insulate your home better than traditional builder’s windows. This insulating effect will also allow your A/C to work less to reach optimal temperatures, leading to lower overall energy consumption in the process.

Interested in learning more about the benefits of impact windows and how they can make a huge difference this summer? Contact the MPACT Windows team online today!