What is the risk reward on doing that? The risk is having freezing pipes and coming home to a cold, flooded and maybe mold filled home. Like the poster before suggested, lower the thermostat.

The potential reward is saving less than a few bucks on heating not knowing your type of heat or energy source....oil, gas, electric. Some people interchange terminology of furnace with boiler or HP etc.

I generally agree with turning off water supply and certain other systems such as heating, water softener etc when vacating a home for more than a day or two in certain seasons because it can reduce other major risks such as leaks or fire. But it all depends.

If you expect the temps to be in the teens for any length of time I'd drain the water pipes, turn the water off and keep the heat between 50 and 60 degrees. Don't risk burst pipes - they will cost a heck of a lot more to repair than a little water and some gas!

When I was only coming here on weekends (before I moved into my house full-time), I would just turn the heat down to 55. I didn't want frozen pipes.

We set our heat to 50 when we leave. In Chicago, we would never turn the thermostat off. Way too dangerous.

We live in Michigan and would never do that. The furnace stays on all winter to prevent frozen pipes. Temperatures in the teens is fairly low. The house will get colder and colder over time because you are not there doing anything to warm it up. I would not do it myself. Why risk a disaster over a moderate amount of heat? Just turn it down to about 55. The other alternative would be to take the water pressure off your pipes by turning off the water pressure and let them drain.

No dont turn it off. Just lower the temp as others have mentioned.

Also you also want to keep the heat on so that your furniture isn't exposed to those cold temperatures. It's not good for wood. You can google it to verify.

I just set mine to 52 degrees, which is the lowest I can go, when I go away for a while in the winter. Just in case, I also leave my cabinet doors under the sink open.

It takes a long time for the house to heat back up, and I would not go lower anyhow.

Leaving the cabinet doors open is a good idea. We set our heat back to 50 when we leave, but only because we can also turn the heat back on from our smartphones. It can take as long as 1.5 hours for the house to heat from 50 to 70, which is also about the time it takes us from landing in a plane to walking in the door.

Never leave heat off if there's a risk of freezing (unless of course house completely prepared by draining all water etc). In fact, I've heard one should be cautious about how close to freezing, because pipes may be in less-heated areas (i.e. outside walls). I would not go below 50F. I would also say it can take more than a few hours to get a house back to desired temperature, depending on specifics of the heating system; I've personally seen and felt where the house's air has been brought up to temperature overall but you can still feel the cold on walls, floors, furniture - the thermal mass inside the house may take considerably longer to even out the temperature.

Turn it down a little, but never off.

Check with your insurance company as to how often it needs to be checked. Most will say the house should be inspected daily, after x days unoccupied.

You may want to turn off your water, and water heater power/gas.