People often talk about the many improvements they can make to their heating, ventilation plus air conditioner to extend its lifespan. Sure, you can use a smart thermostat to schedule running cycles, adjust the temperature on the thermostat up a few degrees while I was in summer time or down while I was in winter, plus so on. You could even invest in many thermostats equipped with zone control technology, so you can leave unoccupied rooms untreated by the Heating & Air Conditioning system. However, what about the actions you can take outside of directly decreasing your system? Planting trees is one possible route of action, since the shade produced by the tree will cause less sunshine to hit (and warm) the wall of the current home where the sun is shining. Another solution comes from the color scheme of the exterior of the home, as pastel or lighter colors can help deflect sunlight. I recognize that’s genuinely the case, because I used to live in a current home that was mostly dark red brick on the outside. Given the dark color plus material itself, the bricks absorbed all of the sunshine plus turned the current home into an oversized pizza oven. One other change that can be made for long-term benefit is to redo the roof shingles, but use light-colored shingles instead of black or dark brown. Like the paint choice, light colored shingles will deflect light more effectively. All of these possibilities are worth considering when pursuing a house improvement project, as they all impact the current home plus how well it deflects summer time heat for years to come!