[NJblue]

Summer AC - for us the AC went on fulltime about mid-May or so. Before that it was on a few days at a time for a hot spell, but mostly off since the humidity level was still low and the nights cooled off considerably. So, with just the windows open and the ceiling fans it was quite enough. Last summer I was hoping to turn the AC off by mid-to-late September, but it stayed warm longer than normal and we used it until sometime in October. Once the AC goes on fulltime, you will probably want it on FULLTIME. The evenings do not get really cool here. They are fairly consistently in the mid-70's and humid. There is so much heat build-up in the attic that the AC will continue to cycle on all through the night to keep the house cool.

For winter, last winter was the coldest on record around here so we used the heat quite a bit. However, I don't think I really turned it on until late December for a day or two here and there. By January, the cold came with a vengeance and we kept the heat on until about mid-March I would guess with the latter period only requiring heat at night. (Of course, we tend to be Eskimos and typically set the heat at 68 during the day and 62 at night and then just wear sweatshirts if we feel cold.)

Excluding the unusual winter that we had, I would expect our normal year to go something like:

Jan-Feb: use the heater about 50-60 percent of the days.
March: heat for perhaps 25% of the days.
April to Mid-May: pretty much no heat/cooling, only occasional use of AC
Mid-May to end of Sept: pretty much 100% AC
Oct: occasional AC
Nov-Dec: Pretty much no heat or cooling except perhaps a little heat first thing in the morning in late December to take the chill out.