What’s the Cost to Replace a Home Thermostat in Denver?

The cost to replace a home thermostat in Denver ranges from $250 to $500+.

But what you’ll actually pay for a new thermostat depends on these 2 cost factors:

1. The kind of thermostat you choose
2. The contractor you hire

Let’s go into more detail about each of these factors and how they affect price.

Factor #1: The kind of thermostat you choose

You can buy 3 types of thermostats (we’ve ordered them here in order of least expensive to most expensive):

1. Manual
2. Programmable
3. Smart

Here’s a quick look at the pros and cons of each type of thermostat at a glance:

Now, let’s look at each of these thermostats more in-depth:

Manual

Manual thermostats cost $50 to $150 on average. You can buy 2 types of manual thermostats:

• Analog: Analog thermostats use bimetallic strips to gauge the temperature, which makes them fairly inaccurate (usually +/- 3° F). You can adjust the temperature and switch the thermostat from heat to cool mode using 2 small levers.
• Digital: Digital thermostats are more accurate than analog manual thermostats, plus they have buttons instead of levers to adjust and control temperature. Digital thermostats are a little more expensive than analog thermostats.

Programmable

Programmable thermostats cost around $100 to $295 on average. The main advantage of programmable thermostats is that you can set them to follow a particular schedule, which can save you money on your energy bills.

In fact, Energy Star estimates that a programmable thermostat can save you $180 per year on heating and cooling costs. Here’s how:

Let’s say you work 8 hours per day, 5 days a week. That’s 40 hours every week you’re out of your house, meaning you don’t need it to stay cool or warm (depending on the season) if no one is there.

For example, let’s say during the summer you leave the house at 8 am and come back home at 6 pm every weekday. And you prefer the house at a cool 70° F. You can set your programmable thermostat to raise your home’s temperature to 78° right at 8 am when the home is empty. But you can also set the thermostat to lower the temperature back to 70° at 5:30 pm so that the house is nice and cool by the time you get home.

In addition to a workday schedule, you can also set a programmable thermostat to adhere to a particular schedule on weekends and vacations.

Smart

Smart thermostats cost $295 to $500 on average. They’re the most expensive kind of thermostat you can buy, but they’re also the best.

Here’s why: They have all the programming and money-saving functions of a programmable thermostat, but they also add in connectivity, learning abilities and other special features:

• Connectivity: Smart thermostats connect to your home’s Wi-Fi which means you can access and control your home’s thermostat remotely via a phone, computer or tablet.
• Learning ability: Instead of having to manually program your thermostat to follow your desired schedules, a smart thermostat can learn your daily routine and automatically adjust itself after about 1–2 weeks of use.
• Special features: These include features like…
  • Touch screen displays
  • System alerts (like dirty air filter & weather notifications)
  • Multiple zone control options
  • Location tracking (can sense when you’re home or not through motion activation)

Factor #2: The contractor you hire

Most HVAC professionals charge an installation labor fee of $125 to $300. And a good rule of thumb is, the better quality the contractor, the more they’ll likely charge for their labor.

Now, don’t let that deter you from hiring a quality contractor because you get what you pay for. A poorly installed thermostat could lead to HVAC problems down the road (remember: the thermostat is the brain of your heating and cooling system), so it’s better to hire a quality contractor who will do a good job.

Our recommendation is to get multiple written quotes from various contractors to see how much they charge, and then check out their online reviews to gauge their customer satisfaction.