Why is my house still so cold?

check of drafts by the doors.put area rugs down

Hi Lou, if your floor is cold have you checked out the bottom seals of all of your exterior doors? During the winter I keep only one exterior door "open" for use, the others I pack blankets around the bottoms of (and these are doors that are only 2 years old!) it makes a big difference though!

What does your thermometer read? Don't go by what you set yours at go by what the actual temp is. Do you have carpeted floors?

You keep your house at 5 degrees hotter than we set ours! And we live in Maine. So some of your coldness might be a being used to warmer weather generally. Do you have curtains/draperies/window shades/shutters etc that you can close at night? We keep draft dodgers at all our doors. Also have a Portiere (double sided velvet curtain) hung on rings at our front door. On our back door we hang all our down coats so they are layered over the opening of the door and all the way from door top to floor. Do you have open concept of separate rooms? In general separate rooms will keep your home warmer as you can close them off or use little heaters in the one you use the most. We also dress for the cold, I have at least 3 layers on top and some kind of legging or long winter underwear under my pants. I also wear socks and warm slippers in the house in cold weather. Good luck! This is a cold winter for folks!

If you don't have carpet, that could be the cause........

If the ceiling temperature is good, add a ceiling fan with a reverse switch to blow that hot air down into the room. When you did the basement ceiling did you also put some insulation between the joists way back where the wall plate meets the floor joists? and use spray foam to seal any cracks, crevices. https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=how+to+insulate+floor+joists+in+basement

Also insulate your electrical outlets with a kit from Frost King.

Make sure those windows have insulation around the openings by using an incense stick burning to check for drafts. If there are drafts you may have to take off the window trim and put insulation in. There are lots of videos on YouTube on how to do this with spray foam insulation or fiberglass. Make sure doorways also have insulation both where the door meets siding, and the opening should have weather stripping.

Insulate your attic to hold the heat in.

You can usually get a free annual energy audit from your power company, give them a call to find their suggestions to increase your house energy efficiency.

I put a rug up the door a few inches and put one of those long sandbag draft things over that against the bottom of the door to hold the rug against the door. That works more for us than just the sandbag thing. Check to see if maybe you need to put the 3M shrink wrap system on your windows, it seems like no matter how new windows are, you can still get a draft around them. The Ceiling fan is a good idea since hot air goes up and cold air goes down. I am like Emily, I always have a sweat shirt on as I get cold easily and always make sure I have fuzzy sox and shoes on. I get cold easily as I in general am pretty skinny compared to hubby who overheats easily, so I get to be cold all the time. The super cold everyone has been having is typical weather and sometimes even warmer than what we get in Minnesota in the winter. Twenty degrees lately is considered a heat wave.

Do you know what R factor insulation you have in your attic. Todays standards are R40. Any less and you are wasting heat through your ceiling. Remove the electrical plates on your plug ins and switch plates and install the foam insulators you can purchase at your hardware store. Check your doors for drafts too.

Alabama construction probably has little to no insulation IN the walls... possibly also leaky corner joints... causing drafts... perhaps air leaks through the wall outlets... ANY perforation of joint in you wall is suspect!

How old is the house?

Do you have insulation in between the wall cavity?

Have you ever had any one check the house to determine whether there are a sufficient number of cold air return vents and/or if they are all functioning properly?