The Most Affordable Smart Termostat: Degrii

This is episode number 306 of The Homeowner Show. Whether you're DIY or looking to hire, we're here to help you find the best information and options for you and your home. My name is Kevin Hackett, and here with me is Craig Williams.

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to The Homeowner Show. We're so glad you could join us for another live episode of The Homeowner Show. How you doing, Kev?

Well, pretty good. I'm wearing shorts and so are you, and it is the middle of December.

Freaking December in Texas.

Well, last week, last week I was the most bipolar month in the state. That's right. I was, I was bundled up and like freezing cold. My wife was like, you wanna put that heavy blanket on the bed? And I was like, sure. And then I couldn't sleep all night cuz I was burning up, dude.

So we, we have developed a strategy over the years.

On our bed. Yeah.

Where we have a light quilt.

Okay.

But then we also have another quilt folded up at the base of the bed.

Okay.

So that should one of us get cold, just grab it and pull it up. So you got 2.

And it's not, it's not a bad idea. I'll tell you, uh, we've probably gone to the dark side.

Uh-huh.

Because we have 2 separate blankets that we sleep under.

We gotta get yours. We gotta get hers. All right.

And we sleep on a queen-size bed and we don't, right? We don't have the king or anything, which we're totally happy with. We don't— I like sleeping next to my wife. I don't know about all you weirdos out there in the king beds, but, um, listen, you get a wife with the Jimmy legs. I don't— thankfully I don't have one of them. But, uh, but yeah, we've got, we've got different, you know, she can have her side and I've got my side. Now, whenever it gets cold enough, I don't mind having the same blanket, but— and we will do that whenever it gets cold enough. But in the summer, like half the time, I don't even want a blanket on. She always wants a blanket on. So

Sometimes I'm like, all right.

So have you, have you seen this whole new thing where, um, like people aren't sleeping with a sheet?

Oh, I, yes. It's, it's really people under the age of 35. Yes. And I, and I know exact, like I've, I've gone down the rabbit hole. I think I know why.

Why? So I'm, I'm genuinely curious.

Yeah.

Because I'm like, what the hell's wrong with you?

No, I know they're weirdos. They're absolute weirdos. But I figured out the secret. to what's happening here.

Yeah.

And I don't think they realize it even because they don't understand what they're missing by having an actual sheet. Sure.

Yes. But when I grew up, other than just laundry.

Well, well, sure. It's like there's, there's that.

There's, you don't have to wash the quilt. I mean, it's like, well, it's true. As often. As often.

So, but you just said something there. The quilt.

Uh-huh.

When I was growing up, the blanket I had would stick you through the sheet. It's the wool blanket.

Like, okay, I see what you're saying. You know, like, oh, okay, I got you.

And so, you know, these are, you know, you're sleeping under a quilt. Like we're, we're talking about like, like thick cotton or wool fabric. Well, guess what? They came out with this product called fleece.

Uh-huh.

And it's super soft, man.

Right.

And so I think we all used a sheet as a protective barrier against, against, against the, the heavy, like, the invading forces. Yeah. The abrasive nature of the blankets that we slept under.

I see what you're saying.

And now these youngins are out there going, why do you need a sheet? It feels glorious underneath this.

They don't know how good they got it.

Yeah. Yeah. This soft, unbelievably great blanket that just feels so good on your skin. Well, we didn't grow up with that. And like, now I don't want straight blanket on my skin whenever I'm sleeping.

Sure.

And like, I rarely want to sit, like, sit under a blanket. I'm not— I'm typically not doing that. Right. But I don't want to sleep under one.

But I also like the generation that has weighted blankets and all this other nonsense.

My daughter has one of those.

So I have one.

I hate it, dude. So she's got this weighted blanket. She's got to take it with her. So like whenever she's got her, her like bag to go somewhere, right? Like this thing weighs 75 pounds. What do you got in here? And I was like, ah, the blanket. She's got the blanket.

Yeah.

So no, she sleeps under a weighted blanket every night.

Every night?

Every night, dude. She's, she loves it.

It's gotta be exhausting.

You would think so, but she, she loves it. I can't do it. No, I can't do it. I I can't hardly sleep under, like, anything too heavy in general.

Now listen, but you get a wife with the Jimmy legs. Well, you put a weighted blanket on that.

It's like, that might calm it down.

Settle it.

Hey, you might have found the—

just simmer, young lady. I'm gonna put the weighted blanket. I'm gonna put the one.

It's like, it's like the straitjacket of all, of all blankets.

It's the kinder, gentler version of a wet blanket.

Yeah. It literally is the same thing. It's, it's the wet blanket without the wet.

The without the wet.

Yeah. It's, it's all the, all the pros and none of the cons.

That's right. So, so settle, settle your gal down someday. Someday a husband will thank you.

That's the slogan. Settle your gal down. Settle your gal down with weighted blanket.

If you're looking, if you're looking for a sponsorship there, weighted blankets, there it is. We got your slogan.

Yeah.

We'll, we'll write you a jingle.

Oh my goodness.

Speaking of which, yeah, we got some sponsors.

We do.

Let's talk about 'em. Who we got?

Well, the first one we're going to talk about this morning is Lone Star Appliance Repair.

Sing their praises.

Man, this company, uh, it was so funny. We were actually, uh, I was, I was at my mom and dad's house this, this past week. And, um, there my mom goes, hey, by the way, if you open the dishwasher door, just know you, you need to be prepared to catch it. And I was like, what? And she's like, She was like, yeah, the spring broke on it. And she was like, come pick this thing up. And I'm like, holy geez, you're not wrong. Like this thing is heavy. And she was like, yeah, I know. Probably all dishwasher doors are heavy. You just don't know it because it's got this internal spring or whatever. And she was like, yeah, I've been telling her dad we need a new dishwasher. And I'm not buying a

new dishwasher. This thing still washes my dishes.

Yeah. Who cares if the door's heavy?

Exactly. And she was like, I care. I'm the one opening and closing it all the time. And she was like, so if you walk in here and you see this dishwasher door open, it's not because I don't want to, you know, close the dishwasher door. It's just I don't want to lift it all the time.

That's fair.

It's fair. It's a good reason. I'm like, Mom, why don't you just get it repaired? And she's like, son, I live in Lamesa. The closest repair place is in Lubbock and they don't want to come out here. And I don't even— she said, I think we've had this thing for like 13 years and I don't even know if they make a spring for it. I was like, well, I guarantee our friends over at Lone Star Appliance Repair would come over and fix this thing.

They know.

They would figure it out. They would figure out what to do. And I promise you there's a part for that. I mean, that is, it's gotta be. And I saw it, it like, is this, it literally just snapped off. It just was old. Um, but I, it was just like this perfect moment where I was like, ah, Lone Star Appliance Repair.

There you go.

That's what you need. 'Cause they would be here.

This is what, this is what needs to happen. Ladies everywhere need to go on strike. And as part of their protest, hand out cards of Lone Star Appliance Repair. It's like, look, we're not doing the dishes until you call.

Right. And I don't want a new dishwasher. I like the one I have.

I want this one.

I want this one. And honestly, I mean, it's a nice stainless steel basket and everything, or whatever they call that surround. It's nice. Obviously, they've had it for a long time, and it works.

Yeah.

The door's junk right now.

Look, this is everybody's conundrum. Like, you bought a matched set of appliances and you don't want to replace it because the new ones don't match the set that you have and the other ones are still working fine. So call an appliance repair company like Lone Star Appliance Repair and just get your appliances fixed. It's way cheaper than getting them, getting a brand new one. You're not going to have to finance it. You're just going to pay, you know, whatever it is to get it fixed. They have the parts in stock. Just give them a call. What's the number?

The number is 936-647-2364, and you can text them.

Text them.

So cool.

Do it because it annoys Darlene, and we love annoying Darlene.

Well, you, you love annoying her more than I do.

Yeah, she's one of my favorite people to annoy.

Well, of course.

Yeah. Our other sponsor tonight is True Texas Solar. Guys, listen, now more than ever, it is becoming increasingly important to have Energy independence control, because we got brownouts, we got blackouts, we got hurricanes, we got tornadoes, we got earthquakes, all these things that can shut down your property. And if you don't have options on your property to keep the power running, to keep, you know, your food cold, to be able to cook your food, to be able to, I mean, just do all the things, read at night like good old Abraham Lincoln. Um, you know, like you need these options in your home in order just to survive.

Right.

You know, and if you're Kevin, you need it just to pump water in your home.

Have to, because you have a well. That's right. I literally, if I lose power, I lose water.

And as cool as LifeStraw is, it's just not going to do the trick. No, no.

I got to, I got to flush the water is the problem, you know? Yeah. And it is a big deal. And what I'll tell you what's really cool is, um, we, we actually have a friend and, uh, tell you who it is later, but, uh, they just built a brand new home and What's so cool is this home, the builder was really smart because they pre-wired it for solar and pre-wired it for an electric vehicle.

Oh, cool.

So yeah, I mean, it's one of those things that's already kind of done, ready to go. You just have to put the solar on there. So, you know, especially if you're in a situation where you're like, look, there's not even any retrofitting that has to be done here. And I was actually talking to Josh, the owner of True Texas Solar, just the other day. And Um, he was telling me about this commercial project they, they have where this guy was getting ready to build a commercial building. And the guy was like, look, I, you know, I'm pretty sure I'm gonna wanna put solar up here, but I wanna make sure that whenever I'm bidding this out, that I, I understand how to bid it out pre-wired for all of the

stuff. And Josh was like, it's so smart cuz it's not gonna cost you that much to do it.

Sure.

Retrofeeding is, is so much more difficult, but it can still be done.

Right.

And so most of you out there who are interested in solar, you're gonna have to retrofit your house in order to, to take the solar, but they do this all the time. That's how this started was by retrofitting stuff to begin with. So they're very versed in it. They're gonna get you taken care of. They're very, very knowledgeable people. And you will, I mean, even if you're just considering it, like if you're, if you're curious about it, they love educating people about it. Right. So call them, give them a shout, see what they can do for you. Their number is 936-286-8325.

Awesome. And thank you guys for supporting our sponsors because they are part of what makes this show happen. The number one late night home improvement show on the internet.

That's it. It's always late night.

Yeah.

It's always late night. Although I'm gonna put a plug in here real quick. We have a show that's gonna come up. It's not gonna be at night.

Right.

It's the very— it's the first of the year.

Right.

It's gonna be on January 3rd.

Okay.

And, uh, it's gonna be with a, a product, a review of a product called Krazy Klean.

Yep.

Krazy Klean is a— it's a toilet cleaner.

Yep.

And, uh, it's really, really cool. And if you haven't, uh, checked it out before, go to Krazy Klean, uh, just, just Google it, but, but spell crazy with a K.

K, yeah.

And clean with a K.

Yeah, we got the CEO coming in town.

Yeah, this is not a remote interview, y'all. He's going to be in town, in studio. And here's the thing, man. I don't know for sure, but there's a word on the street there might be some prizes, some giveaways, some things like that. But it's going to be on January 3rd in the morning.

In the morning.

That's it.

I'll save the full story for when he's in town, but I actually sold one of these. in Conroe Town Square the other day.

Did you really?

I was, I was standing on the street corner and talking about this stuff and I was telling somebody about how, 'cause we got, we have 2 of them in our house.

Yeah.

I was telling him about how good it works and he was like, what's that thing?

Yeah.

I'll tell the full story when he's in town.

That's great. Anyway, just a plug.

Yeah. So we're gonna be talking about a new smart thermostat that I just installed on my house. Okay. Before we get there, I gotta tell you, because this is something that's gonna pique your curiosity.

Okay.

I think I have a new favorite spice blend.

A new favorite spice blend?

I do, yeah.

Really?

Yes.

Oh, I love spice. I love spices.

Listen, this is an H-E-B only spice blend.

Is it made by their True Texan or—

You can only get it in their bulk foods section.

What?

Yeah.

Okay.

And I will, I will tell everybody this. I like simple spices.

All right.

And so, like, typically when I'm seasoning my beef or my chicken or really most anything, it's garlic, pepper, salt.

Yeah. That blend is perfect. Look, especially for steak.

Yes. Oh, so it is. Yeah. For steak, it is absolutely glorious.

1 to 1.

When it's, when it's poultry, I typically am adding like another herb or something like that in the mix. Maybe some paprika. There's other— it depends on what I'm making, honestly. But like most of the time, if I want to taste the meat, garlic pepper salt.

That's it.

That's it. That's all it needs if it's good meat.

Agreed.

So H-E-B has an oak smoked garlic pepper salt.

What?

Spice blend.

Oh my goodness.

And it is freaking fantastic.

Have, have you put it on a steak yet?

Yes.

Oh my goodness.

This, but, and that's, but that's honestly, it's not where it shines.

Okay.

Burgers. Oh, I bet, dude, on a burger. Oh, it kills it. It absolutely kills it. I don't know. I don't know how long H-E-B has had this. I don't know, like, because I don't typically go down the bulk food aisle.

No, I don't either. Uh, why would you?

I, well, I mean, like, mo— okay. Honestly, most of the time it's because I'm eating I've been doing a lot of carnivore diet.

Okay, yeah.

And if I haven't been doing carnivore, it's been like carnivore with like vegetables.

Sure. But who needs 48 ounces of green beans?

But like, this is, this is like the aisle that typically has like, you can buy like bulk peanuts.

Sure.

Or you can buy bulk cashews.

Right.

And like peanuts and legumes, like nuts and legumes just aren't on the diet.

No.

Like, as much as I love them.

No.

And I absolutely love nuts and legumes and all that, all that kind of stuff.

They're fat heavy and—

Yes.

They're carb heavy.

So, and it's where you can buy like their honey peanut butter. Oh yeah. You grind it right there. And it's, it's delicious. And they have like, but they also have their bulk spices.

Interesting.

But they now have, and I don't know how long they've had it. Maybe they've had it for a long time and I just didn't know.

Okay.

Oak smoked Garlic pepper salt.

Is it in a bag or is it—

No, no, no. You get as much of it as you want.

Oh, it's literally a scoop and you put it— Yes. So you need your own shaker.

Well, I mean, I just get a plastic bag and I just fill it up with it.

Sure.

After the show, if you want, I'll let you have a sniff. I got some up in the kitchen.

I'll even taste it. Yeah, no, but you can buy shakers.

Well, you can. Yeah.

Which would be great. I mean, obviously you probably want to buy it at the store in a bag, so you're only paying for the weight, right?

But like where my brain went is I want to do a brisket.

That's what I was about to say. Yeah.

I want to do a brisket with it or, or maybe like a pork butt with it.

Yeah. Well, yeah.

But like, we talked about this before. I want, I want to do it, but I want to blend it with brown sugar and see what that does. Yeah. That's what I want to do. I want to see what it does with that.

Okay.

I will tell you this. I did do a pot roast with it.

Okay.

And it was really, really good.

Oh, I bet.

Now it was a pot roast of red wine, tomato sauce, and beef stock.

Oh, nice.

But I seared the outside of the roast with those spices.

Interesting.

And then let that sit in there with the onions, the carrots, and the potatoes, and just let it sit and think about each other.

That sounds delicious. Yeah, it was.

It was the stock. If nothing else, man, I could have just, I could have just drank the stock.

Yeah.

It was so good.

So anyway, um, that, that was mean.

You know that?

That was just downright mean.

Well, it's not the meanest thing I've ever done.

Well, that's for sure. We're not gonna get into that. Let's talk about this thermostat.

Uh, man, I'm trying to—

herring. So it's, it's what, what we're talking about tonight is the Degree thermostat. It's spelled D-E-G-R-I-I.

Right.

But it's degree. And one of the things that's the most fascinating thing about this, I think we should save to the very end.

Okay.

And let's talk about what it is and how it functions, and then we'll get to the most fascinating thing at the end, if you get my drift. Do you get my drift? I think you do.

Yeah, I do. I do. So one of the things that's interesting about degree is it's not the only thing that they make.

Oh, I didn't realize that.

So they make 2 things.

Okay.

One is thermostats and the other is cordless robotic pool cleaners.

Oh, I see that now.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Interesting.

So you—

so I have a, I have a cordless robotic pool skimmer.

Right.

which is awesome. I mean, it— the thing is amazing, but I, I've never— I, and I do have a pool cleaner, like a robotic cleaner, but it's not, it's not cordless.

Yeah. So, and, and so it's, it's interesting in that, in that regard.

Um, yeah.

So, and they all sort of operate off of the same— well, go ahead and pull that Band-Aid off. They do have their own app.

Oh, okay.

Yeah. And, and so all of the thing— the reason we ended up with this, there's, there's a big reason we ended up with it, and we'll, I guess we'll talk about that at the end of the show. But, like, one, it has its own app. The thermostat that Jehu had put in for us had one, and it was a Honeywell, which I ended up uninstalling the Honeywell from our main house and installing it in the guest house.

Oh, okay.

Because it's, it's a good thermostat.

Sure.

It's Wi-Fi enabled. You can control it, all that kind of good stuff. Um, but like one of the things that I'm noticing on some thermostats is you don't have a top end and a bottom end. Meaning like, like, like in here, like even, even the, the mini split that we have in here, you can set it to auto.

Right.

Right.

But it's got one temperature rating for that auto.

One temperature rating for that auto. But if it, if it needs to, it'll turn the heat on.

Right.

But if it needs to, it'll turn the cooling on.

But it'll only, like, if you have it set for 70, that's it. It'll cool to 70. It'll heat to 70.

Right.

That's one of the things I love about the Ecobee.

Right.

That's, that's—

is you have a range.

You have a range and you, like, literally at home right now, I have it on auto and my heat is set to 68. My air conditioner is set to 72.

Correct me if I'm wrong. Ecobee has a limit as to where you can set the range.

Yeah. The limits, I think it's a 5-degree limit.

Right.

Yeah. So you can, So you could do like 68 and 73, but you probably couldn't do 68 and 74, for example.

With this one, I don't think there is a limitation on the range.

I'm telling you, man, that feature alone is worth buying a new thermostat for.

Yes.

Because it is, especially for us that live in South Texas where the temperatures can vary rapidly. Rapidly. I mean, literally, like tomorrow it's supposed to drop again.

And so, You know, I was literally playing with the app today and I was like, how far can I make this apart? And I was like, it's not telling me that I can.

Right.

Other than like, you know, reasonable temperatures.

Sure. Interesting.

Yeah. So that was cool. Yeah. It does have geofencing.

Okay.

It does have programming. So you can set different temperatures for, like, you can have a whole schedule for the day or, you know, you can set temperatures for Monday and different from Tuesday. You can set different weekend temperatures. All, all that kind of stuff is there. And like, that was the coolest part, honestly.

Yeah.

Installation, I think it took me 10 minutes.

Oh, okay.

Not bad at all.

Yeah. Does it, does it have the option for a C wire if you need it?

Yes.

Okay, great.

So it has, it comes standard with the C wire. If it, if your system doesn't have a C wire, it has a C wire compatibility.

Yeah.

It's just, it's just a different thing that you put on.

And I—

there's prompts within the app that tells you how to install it. I didn't have to do that because I have a C wire.

Right.

But it does have a little module that you can add on to your system if you don't have a C wire.

All right.

And it even, it even adjusts based on what kind of heating that you have.

Interesting. So if you've got a boiler or you've got—

Heat pump. It even goes out of its way to say, like, hey, if you're using, like, a pellet tile style system to heat your home, we're probably not gonna be able to give you the efficiency numbers that you wanna hear. Oh, I love that. You know, but, like, and so—

Setting expectations.

Yeah. And so, like, it, it recognizes that, like, there are people out there that are using different methods of heat in order to heat their home.

Yeah.

But, like, it may not be able to service those.

Okay.

So it, it states that pretty clear at the upfront.

Alright.

And so it seems to be pretty compatible with most systems. And so it wants to know if you're using electric. It wants to know if you're using geothermal. It wants to know if you're using gas. It wants, you know, it just wants to know.

Just so that it can—

Well, it wants to give you the appropriate amount of feedback so that it can give you the expectations of the amount of money that you'll be saving using this thermostat.

Okay.

And so that, that was huge.

Yeah.

App control via Wi-Fi, that's huge.

Yeah.

The thing that I thought that was really interesting about it is it has a very low-tech view of it.

Okay. Yeah.

Meaning, you know, it, it, it's not like high resolution on the screen or anything like that. And it's also a matte screen.

Oh.

Which is different.

Okay.

You know, rather than having like an LCD or something like that, You know, most of them have kind of like a black and white, grayish kind of LCD screen, pretty low-tech looking where it'll give you the numbers. But honestly, to me, it looks like a VCR most of the time. Oh, okay. Yeah.

Yeah. It's got— it's got—

not the Ecobee.

No. The Ecobee looks normal.

Yes.

Whatever normal looks like. This has almost like an 8-bit look to it.

Yes.

Okay.

Yeah. What I was talking about though is like, other than Ecobee, all other thermostats, kind of have a VCR look to them.

Good point.

You know what I mean? And, and so, but like, this is something different from both of them.

Okay.

Whereas it's, it's, I don't even know how to describe it, man. It, like, the best way I can describe it is like, it's a matte screen. And so it's not bright, but like what you're saying is 8-bit and that, that is absolutely true.

Yeah.

Um, but like, it's also very clear.

Sure.

You know, it's like, you, you have no question as to what you're even looking at.

Right.

Because the 8-bit is so big on the screen and it's like a pill.

Yeah.

It's not—

It looks— it's pill-shaped.

Yeah. And so it's high-tech, but at the same time it's low-tech because of the output on the screen. But the screen is so cool because, like, it, it doesn't look like it's coming from anywhere specific.

Okay.

It just looks like it's part of the whole unit.

Okay.

And so it's different in that regard.

Yeah.

But to me, I mean, like, plus sides. The app was super helpful in setting up. It gave you a step-by-step walkthrough.

It's helpful.

Was very helpful in the safety end, made sure it like gave you multiple options to turn the power off so that you don't kill yourself.

Good.

And even wants to know like, hey, is this a high voltage system? Because you should probably shouldn't be touching that.

Yeah.

And things like that. And so like it was really helpful. And so like there's like the mount and the mount is what you plug the wires into. And this is pretty typical now.

Sure.

Where it's like the actual thermostat is like a plug that you jack into the wall mount.

Yeah. After you've wired it. The Ecobee is the same thing. Yeah.

It's the same. Most, most of them are.

Yeah.

Um, and so I, I actually installed 2 thermostats today.

Really?

Yeah. And like all within the span of an hour.

Oh, wow.

Yeah. I mean, like—

That's quick.

Yeah, it was super quick.

Yeah.

Um, but like all you really need to do these things now is like a Phillips head and a flathead screwdriver.

Mm-hmm.

Um, and the only reason I needed a flathead is because the one in the guest house was super old and I had to like unscrew the wires.

Okay.

You know, like they were like the screw down kind of, kind of instead of like the press and push.

Right.

Um, so the, the, it was, it was super fun. Um, you know, and, and like, not to, not to like bury the lead on, on this or anything like, but like, I, I, I, I paid $29 for this thing.

Yeah. That's how much it cost.

What?

Right now? Right now, right now it is on sale. It's on sale from $49 to $39. And then there's a $10 off coupon. Right.

Yeah. That's what everybody needs to know. It's on Amazon.

Yeah, it's on Amazon.

And we're not telling you that because we have, like, some sort of deal with Amazon. Like, we're not doing anything with this. We're just letting you know, like, this is a product I put in my house.

$30.

But, like, right now, $30.

You can't even buy a non-smart thermostat for $30 at Lowe's or Home Depot.

You can't even buy a temperature gauge that connects to an Ecobee for that much.

No. No, you're right. Yeah, those, those little, uh, the wireless set points or whatever. Yeah, yeah, those are— yeah, those are— I think those are a 2-pack is like $60.

And I'm not knocking Ecobee. We have Ecobee for years.

And I still have mine. I love it.

Yeah, it's fantastic. Yeah, but like, honestly, this does the exact same thing.

Sure. And like, one, one of the things this doesn't have is like the Ecobee, the newest one has like Alexa built into it. You know how many times I've used that?

Never.

Never.

Yeah.

'Cause it doesn't matter. It's not something you're like, you could be like, hey Alexa, change the temperature. But I don't do that.

Right.

I don't know. Like, I'm sure there are monsters out there that change their thermostat every day. Um, uh, you know, I, I guess if you don't have a smart thermostat and it doesn't, like, you're literally going the old, you know, moving the dial, the dial back and forth, that would be one thing. Uh, but most people have some sort of a digital thermostat these days.

Sure.

You know, of some sort. And you're just not changing it. You're setting it to where you want to go and you're leaving it there. So the whole Alexa thing is a novelty more than anything else.

Yeah. So, and like, it, you know, it will work with, with Alexa.

Okay.

It will work with HomeKit.

Oh yeah. But it just doesn't have it built in.

It's not built in. No.

But if it works with it, If it's compatible with it, well, then, dude, I mean, you can— so at that point, you're right. You can set all of the— whenever you arrive home, whenever you're leaving, all these sorts of things can be built in through those apps.

Yeah. And, like, I will tell you, this is— this has been my wife's biggest complaint with the one that we moved over to the guest house, which is the Honeywell. The Honeywell, we can schedule.

We can—

we can do all kinds of stuff with it. The problem with it is— is it doesn't have a range set.

I know, man. That is, I'm telling you, that is a big deal.

And so you can only do heat or cool. It's one or the other. It's not both and.

Yeah.

And this one we can do both and.

It makes a difference.

You know, and, you know, and so it doesn't matter if in the middle of the night she can pick up her app and, you know, drop the temperature a couple of degrees. That doesn't matter.

Doesn't matter.

Because we don't have that range set that we can like set as a geofence when we're gone during the day.

Right.

You know, and, and, and not only that, just at night. Like, if you just have, like, a weird cold front blow through, you know, you wanna be able to set that temp. Like, look, we don't want the house to get any colder than 67 degrees.

Right.

You know? And if it does, turn the heat on.

Right. Please. Yep. Exactly.

You know? And, and so, like, having these options in place where we can just have a range set that we don't want it to fall outside of those parameters is Crucial.

Yeah.

For us. You know, and, like, I don't, I mean, like, for, you know, maybe if I had, like, a one-story home, like what you guys have, probably not, maybe not be as big of a deal. We have a 3-story home.

Right.

You know? And so, like, the top, oh, can get a lot hotter.

Yeah.

Than the bottom.

I'm sure.

You know? And, and, and so we need to be able to set those ranges because our thermostat actually sits on the second floor.

Yeah. It does.

You know? And so that's actually—

Second and a half floor, actually.

Well, yeah, it's— well, there's that. Multi-levels, multi-levels.

It's right in between.

It's right in between the second and the second and a half floor, right?

It's an Escher house.

That's right.

It's fine.

The second and one, right?

So true. Yeah, I'm face to face with it whenever I stand next to it.

That's right. So, but like, like, but that's like a great spot for us to control the temperature on the third floor and the first floor and keep that at an even keel.

Right.

You know, no worries. Um, 'cause my, my son's bedroom's on the 3rd floor and sometimes he's like, Dad, it's hot.

I'm sure it is.

I'm like, dude, just turn the fan on or open a window.

Right. You gotta do something. I can't change it everywhere.

But that was when we had the Honeywell.

Ah, man. Now it changes everything. It is a game changer. Like, and, and it, at $29, like there's—

That's the thing I don't think people understand. Like shop around your, your smart thermostats.

Oh.

and see, and like, you know, and we'll like, look, we're, you know, look, we've been doing the show for 6 years.

Yeah.

If in a year it craps out, okay, we'll tell you.

Yes, we will. And, and most likely, I mean, right now, if I go to, you know, go look at—

But if I bought 3 of them in a year—

That's what I was gonna say. Like the Ecobee 3, the Lite version, which is not the one that has Alexa, it's $130. Right. Right?

That's 4 of them.

That's exactly right. You, you jump up to, um, to the Eco Bee 4 and you, you go to those. Well, they're like $200, aren't they? Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

And so, and again, you're great product.

No, it's a great product. No, it's, it is. But whenever you look at that in comparison to this, if it craps out, I'm just saying you can buy 4 of them.

Yeah.

Before you start losing money on this thing.

Now, I mean, like, like, you know, factor in install.

Trouble.

Downtime, all that kind of, fair enough. But like, you know, like, that's to be seen.

We don't know yet.

And like my Ecobee, the last Ecobee that I had lasted just under 2 years.

Right. Before it crapped out. So in comparison, like the Google Nest thermostat's $95.

Uh-huh.

The, the Amazon Smart Thermostat.

Which is comparable, I think.

It's comparable.

Yeah.

But it's $60 on sale. It's normally $80.

Yep.

All right. The Honeywell you were talking about, um, I don't know if it's the exact same one, but a Honeywell, which is a pretty nice one. Uh, yeah, this one's probably nicer than that one.

Um, is it T5 or T9?

No, this one's got like some long— okay. It's like RTH9600.

It's square, whatever the one I was—

yeah, I didn't have This one's kind of a rectangle, but my point is like you start looking around and they're just a big range of what you're going to be spending. And it's going to cost a lot of money.

As we've been doing the show, Amazon updated and it said only 2 left in stock.

Oh, well, you better get on it, people.

Give us a call to greet.

I mean, yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah, exactly. Exactly. We're gonna be tagging them.

Yeah.

Yeah. Well, I look, I think it's, I think it's a great option if you're, if you've been wanting to get into the smart thermostat, um, game, this is a great way to do it. If you've got a smart thermostat and you're not really happy with it, go try it out. Yeah. What's literally, what are you gonna lose?

What are you losing?

Nothing.

Like it's less than a trip to the grocery store.

Right. Oh geez. Like the gas to get me to the grocery store's cheaper. to buy this. Geez. Than to buy gas. Unbelievable. Yeah. So anyway, cool. What else do we need to talk about with it?

That's it, man. I mean, like, you know, we've got the Christmas season coming up. We've got the, the interview coming up with, uh, you know, Crazy Clean. We got a lot of fun stuff coming. We got, we're excited about 2025.

Oh yeah.

You know, we, we did our, our big live event for election night. Mm-hmm. I think we're planning on doing a couple more of those, man, this upcoming year. And, you know, probably I know we're doing a live event in January, right? Uh, back out at, uh, Moonshine Deck.

Yeah.

Um, so we got that going on. Um, man, there's just a lot of stuff going on. We're excited. The, the show continues to grow and expand and, uh, we appreciate y'all. Yeah. Thank y'all for listening.

That's it. Well, cool. If you haven't already, uh, for those of you out there who listen often, please share our show. I mean, it would, it would be a wonderful thing to do for us. And you can go on all of our channels, whether it's YouTube, Facebook, you know, go ahead and like, subscribe, share. And if you haven't already, please hop over to the iTunes, Amazon— not Amazon, the Apple—

Whatever that is.

Yeah, we'll talk to you later. See ya!