Controlling the humidity at your New Jersey Shore Home in the wintertime can make a big difference. Cold temperatures often result in your home not being humid enough, and this is due to a few factors.

First, cold air cannot hold as much moisture as warm air. Think the opposite of a muggy summer day. The colder it is, the dryer it is.

As a result of the cold weather,  the furnace kicks on. This adds warmth, which makes it possible for the air to hold more moisture. But, since the windows and doors are closed, no moisture can make it's way into your home. 

This results in the air getting even less humid than it was before. A common problem and sign that your home is less humid is static electricity, which travels easily in the cold, dry air. But, there are also health concerns that come along with the reduced humidity. 

A house with low humidity can lead to dry, irritated skin and eyes, nosebleeds and more colds/illnesses in the winter. The cold air can actually draw moisture from your tear ducts, leaving you with dry eyes. It also saps moisture from your skin, leading to dry and cracking skin, a very common problem in the wintertime.

Meanwhile, your mucous membranes can also get similarly irritated, leading to nosebleeds. The same happens in your respiratory tract. This is why you’re more susceptible to colds and viruses entering the body when it's cold out. 

Fortunately, there are easy steps you can take to control your home humidity in the winter. Doing so increases your comfort and keeps you healthy.

DIY Ways To Adjust Winter Humidity

If the humidity level isn’t too far off in the winter, there are some simple things you can do around the house to benefit your health and comfort. Many of these cost little, or even nothing, and just take a few minutes to set up.

First, try air-drying your clothes instead of using the dryer if you have the time. The moisture from the clothes will stay in the air. And there’s one less appliance generating more dry heat.

Another idea is to try leaving bowls of water around the house. Eventually, the water evaporates into the air. For a quicker and potentially less messy solution, boil some water on the stove.

Products To Help Adjust Winter Humidity

Of course, those DIY solutions may not create enough humidity to improve your health or comfort in your Jersey Shore home. Maybe they’re just not your style. Fortunately, there are products you can buy for relatively little money that increase humidity in your home for the winter.

First is the obvious one: a humidifier. Most of these home products are “evaporative” humidifiers. They simply turn moisture into mist and then push that mist into the air in a room. Although they range from $10 to over $200, humidifiers around $20 to $50 will generally handle an average-sized room.

A less conventional option is an indoor vent kit. They cost around $10 and you can easily install on the end of your dryer’s vent hose.

Usually, that hose leads outside, releasing heat, moisture, and lint from your dryer. The vent kit is basically a cap on the end of that hose. This way you can keep the hose in the house without the lint flying around.

Then, that moisture circulates through the house, adding to humidity. As an added bonus in the winter, the heat stays indoors too.

How To Measure Humidity In The Winter

Of course, it’s easy to go overboard when trying to adjust your home humidity for health and comfort in the winter. Too much humidity, or moisture in the air, and you can run into to other problems.

These can be anything from paint starting to bubble or wallpaper peeling, to more allergens hanging in the air. Fortunately, you can track the moisture in your home to see how effective — or not — your improvements are.

For this, you just need a hygrometer. It’s a simple tool that measures the humidity in your home just as a thermometer tells you the temperature. A decent digital one with a thermometer costs around $20. Older, analog hygrometers are as cheap as $5.

When using one, however, understand that it’s giving you the “relative” humidity, not the “absolutely” humidity. Relative is the one you hear in weather reports, shown as a percentage. It tells you how much moisture in the air in relation to how much moisture air at that temperature can hold.

Remember how cold air can hold less moisture than warm air? That means an amount of moisture in colder air results in higher relative humidity than the same amount of moisture in the colder air. That’s because it takes up more of the colder air’s capacity.

For winter temperatures, you never want humidity over 40 percent. Just under that amount is perfect when it’s between 20 and 49 degrees outside. When the outside temp drops between ten and 20, keep the humidity below 30 percent.