Nest, Ecobee, Honeywell are all great thermostats. The problem is some homes have
1) Less than the six(6) wires needed at the thermostat if you have a heat pump.
2) Have a two(2) wire communicating Carrier thermostat installed.
I've seen both in the same areas and have no idea why some homes are one way or another.
Addressing item #1 If you have less than Six(6) wires. If your HVAC company suggests running a new wire, they are ripping you off. All these premium thermostats above have an adaptor, usually included that converts five or less wires to six giving you the Common or Ground wire needed for these wifi smart thermostats. Always check your existing wiring behind your thermostat before purchasing a new one.
Addressing item #2, For some reason in some Villages a Carrier communicating thermostat was installed although there was a Five or Six wire cable in the wall. There is no advantage to this type of thermostat unless you don't have the necessary wires or you want to save money on copper cable. With these systems you will see a white box mounted on the side of your Air Handler in the garage. With the power Off, you need to disconnect the wires and remove the circuit board in that white box and spice the wires from the Air Handler to the thermostat cable. You can use the white box as a splice box. When this is done all the wires at the thermostat should be correct to install your new wifi smart thermostat.
As far as which brand to get. I've had Honeywell and Nest and both worked great but the best i've used is the ecobee Smart Thermostat Premium with Smart Sensor and Air Quality Monitor. $217 on Amazon. Sometimes they run a sale. Why do I recommend this unit? Because it comes with one remote temperature/motion sensor, more can be added, that you can put in other rooms in you home to get better temperature distribution in homes with one zone like we have here in the Villages. So for example, my office in the front of my Ivy home gets the sun in the afternoon and is always a couple degrees warmer than the rest of my house. I placed the Ecobee remote sensor in my office so if i'm in that room in the afternoon and its warmer the Ecobee thermostat will turn on the A/C to lower the temperature in my office while i'm in there, averaging the temperature for that time across my home. The Ecobee thermostat is very smart and i've been saving money in heating and airconditioning cost ever since I've had it. It also has an intuitive phone App and a very comprehensive web interface showing how efficient your home is compared to others in your area, when the A/C and heat is on, outside temperature, etc... You can easily see on a graphic display how the thermostat is turning on and off the system 24x7. No more guessing if the Aux heat came on or if the A/C is not keeping up during very hot days. I highly recommend this thermostat. The user interface on the thermostat is also very easy to understand with an explanation on all the advanced settings if you want to tweak them.
I've installed several of these wifi thermostats for friends and neighbors so if you have a question PM me.
John
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