Advice on warmer state

[Kara315]

It won't be for a couple years, but i'm going to be moving to North Carolina from New York. I'm just worried as it's warmer year round in NC as NY get pretty darn cold during the winter and during that time I obviously don't need to worry about it being too warm, but when summer comes I always get a little nervous even though they are in the basement and it's nice and cool. I'm worrying a bit about North Carolina as the weather is a lot warmer year round.....was wondering what others do, not just NC but any of the warmer southern states. Do you only have them in basements, or in another room always with AC?
Even hear I've always been worried about having them in a room with AC all the time incase the power went out etc....
Any advice would be great.

 

[ticklechin]

I would guess its "normal" back east to own generators, so you should look into that along with a wall a/c unit as a back up. Craigslist is a good place to get used generators, just google the calculation for how many watts you would need for a wall a/c unit and a few other items.

 

[Chinmama]

I'm in South Carolina and most homes here have central air conditioning. We do have a small window unit as a back up and if we ever need to use it, we move the chinchillas from our living room into one of the extra bedrooms and put the unit in there.

 

[fuji9991]

I don't know about North Carolina but I have been to South Carolina and it gets majorly hot in south Carolina. If you look up wather sites they should show a median temp for the months of the year and you can compare to NY. The jet stream usually never dips below south carolina which is what allows the cold arctic air down over the northern states. I am not sure if the jet stream dips under north carolina or not.

My guess is you will need some form of AC on hand.

 

[Kara315]

I'm in South Carolina and most homes here have central air conditioning. We do have a small window unit as a back up and if we ever need to use it, we move the chinchillas from our living room into one of the extra bedrooms and put the unit in there.

Thanks. I might look at small houses for myself. I was looking at townhomes, some have central air and most don't have a basement. I guess I'm just nervous if I get somewhere that doesn't have a basement, which are easier to find, and it does have central air, what would happen if we lost power during a warm day when I was at work.

 

[BooBoo*TheKiddo*]

If you are worried about it while at work, maybe make friends with the neighbor and they can let you know if there is a power outage.

 

[Idgie]

I live in Chicago and it is too hot here (and humid) to not have air conditioning. We do have our neighbors call if the power is out for awhile. There is also a device that you can buy to leave in your home that will send you a phone message alert if the temp in the house gets too high.

 

[Chinmama]

Most houses here do not have basements. Older homes will have basements, but most newer (in the last 30 years or so) are on a crawl space or slab foundation.

We rarely lose power for extended periods, but if we ever do we have asked our neighbor call us. He works from home, so he's always there during the day.

 

[Airyn]

I'm in Pennsylvania, but it still gets pretty hot and humid here. I moved last year and now commute 25 miles to work, so outages were a huge concern for me as well. My chins are in their own room with a window unit, which I leave on from late April until early November. The unit I have automatically adjusts the AC to reach a specific temp and goes down to 64.

Beyond that, I wound up buying a remote temperature and humidity monitoring system off of Amazon about a year ago and it's seriously been a godsend for my paranoia. I've only had to replace the batteries once, received an alert one week before they actually died, and can check the temp and humidity from any device with an internet connection.

I went with this one...

And this is the public URL for my chin room...

If you do decide to keep them in a basement, keep in mind that the humidity is generally pretty bad, often with those hideous camel crickets, so a dehumidifier wouldn't be a bad idea either.

 

[threewingedfury]

I've lived in North Carolina my entire life and an a/c is a must - even year round here. I normally don't cut the a/c off until mid-November, and sometimes run it in December on the days that are near 70. I've been running the a/c on and off for almost a month now - we've had quite a few days near 90 since the beginning of March and in between days with ice. Starting next week, I most likely will have the a/c on non-stop until the end of summer because it will be over 70 every day. I make sure that when it hits 65, the a/c goes on.

Basements are not common where I live, they're actually very rare, but I guess it depends on where you are located in NC. I've been wanting to sell my house to find a house with a basement, but they're rather expensive in this area and not with the extra $20-30k to me. Central air is much more common, but depending on your location as well. I live in an older house and we never put central air in, so I use window units, but you have to keep them good and clean. No one else in my neighborhood uses window units, they're all hooked to central air.

I purchased a generator off Craigslist for $250 when a streamline wind came through a couple years ago and knocked power out for 2 days, but I haven't had to use it yet. I made sure to get one that would power my 15,000 BTU a/c in the chin room with no issues.