My roommate, Joanne and I have finally fixed an ongoing problem between us. After moving in together, Joanne and I began to realize that we couldn’t agree on how to operate the air conditioner. Joanne wanted to keep the A/C operating all of the time because she gets hot so easily. I was definitely more inclined to keep it off unless it was absolutely a requirement to handle the heat. I think I was less willing to run the air conditioner because my parents taught me to save energy by only running the A/C on super hot and sticky afternoons. Each time the energy bill would arrive in the mail, I would get super upset because it seemed unreasonably high. I knew that this was because of Joanne turning down the thermostat and blasting the air conditioner so often. We couldn’t come to a solution until we spoke to our landlord. When we told him the problem and mentioned we were considering moving out, he offered to upgrade to a zone controlled A/C unit. I had never heard of this types of cooling system before. The landlord explained that it would allow us to cool individual rooms without impacting the entire house. This sounded great for us. Joanne can run the a/c in her room, and we don’t have to maintain every room at the same level. The zone controlled system was installed, and we immediately noticed a reduction in our monthly energy bill. We’ve saved a ton of money, and improved the comfort in the house. Joanne and I are both happy now. We no longer pay to cool empty rooms, and we each get to determine the temperature setting in our individual bedrooms.