HomeWatt started with a frustration. After more than a decade of walking through American homes with a clipboard, our editor kept meeting people who had spent real money on devices that could not possibly help — a smart thermostat installed in a house that leaks air like a screen door, a bank of solar-powered gadgets in an attic with four inches of insulation.
None of them had been badly advised, exactly. They had been advised by people selling things.
What we cover
Everything here lives in one category, Home Energy: how houses use energy, where it escapes, and which of the increasingly large pile of smart devices genuinely helps. Thermostats, lighting, heat pumps, plugs, monitors, and the unglamorous envelope work that outperforms all of them.
We write for homeowners, not for installers. That means we explain the thing before we compare the products, and we assume you would rather understand your house than be handed a shopping list.
How we work
- Envelope before equipment. Air sealing and insulation come first in almost every house. We will keep saying it even though it sells nothing.
- Ranges, never promises. Savings depend on your climate, your house, your rates, and your habits. Anyone quoting you a precise dollar figure without seeing your home is guessing.
- We say when something is not worth buying. A good share of our articles conclude that the device in question will not do much for you.
- We update rather than repost. Equipment and standards change. When they do, the original article is revised and the change is noted.
What we will not do
We publish general information, and there are firm limits on it. We do not give safety instructions for work involving gas appliances, combustion venting, or household wiring — those go to a licensed professional, every time, without exception. We do not diagnose faults in a specific reader’s equipment from a description. And we do not quote current tax credit amounts, rebate eligibility, or financing terms, because those change constantly and getting them wrong costs people real money; we point you to the administering agency instead.
Who writes here
Dana Whitfield — Editor. Dana spent eleven years performing residential energy assessments across the Midwest and Pacific Northwest, and estimates she has been in roughly two thousand attics and crawlspaces. She moved to writing partly because it is easier on the knees and partly because the same five conversations kept repeating in different houses. She has a strong and openly stated bias toward the boring fixes — sealing, insulating, and finding out which appliance is quietly costing you money — over anything with an app.
How this site is funded
HomeWatt is free to read and is supported by display advertising, plus affiliate links on some pages. If you use an affiliate link and buy something, we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.
Advertisers have no visibility into or influence over our articles; ads are placed automatically by third-party networks. Commissions do not shape recommendations either — the most common advice on this site is to spend the money on caulk and insulation, which pays us nothing at all. Our full disclosure is on the Disclaimer page.
Corrections
If something here is wrong, we want to know. Write to corrections@homewattguide.otctablets.com with a source, and we will verify it, fix the article, and record what changed.
Get in touch
Questions about your own house are welcome at hello@homewattguide.otctablets.com or through our Contact page. We cannot diagnose a specific problem remotely, but we can usually tell you what to look at and which kind of professional to call.