https://cleverleverage.com/certified-saunas/
Video Transcript (AI Generated)
What’s happening guys?
Long time no chat.
As you can see I’m not in a…
I guess I could take this off couldn’t I?
I’m not in my normal office.
I am up in Maine in my grandmother’s cabin.
I guess I could just show you guys really quick.
It is my 29th year coming up here.
I’ve been coming to this little place since I was young.
We’re way up in the boonies of Maine.
This is my grandmother’s cabin.
I’ve got a fire going.
Tons and tons of snow outside.
Let’s see if you guys can see.
That’s usually the top of the bird feeder.
It’s about 6 1/2 feet tall.
It gives you an idea of how much snow is out there.
Current temperature today is almost to 20.
It’s a rather warm day.
The wind chill has been really giving me a hard time.
I was up on the roof doing a little bit of roof repairs.
We had a little bit of trouble with some snow and ice.
Man that is bright for me.
Let me see if I can close these.
I had a few minutes to answer some sauna questions.
That’s better.
And get to some of these requests.
A little change of pace.
Quite different being 1500 miles away from Orlando, Florida to Eustis, Maine.
I’ve got a bunch of questions and a bunch of emails that I haven’t been able to get to.
Most of them are asking about the certified sauna lists.
How I came up with those saunas.
Why they’re on there.
A bunch of different things.
This is going to be a longer video but I’m going to go through each point.
We’re going to talk about some of the pros and the cons.
Where the certified sauna list came from.
Who tested them.
Is everything rock solid.
This, that and the other.
By the end of this video a lot of your questions should be addressed.
If not, as always, let me know in a future comment.
I’ll include them in the next video.
First up is the saunas that are on the list of certified saunas.
Why did they make the list?
Quite simply, they passed my EMF testing.
I have a particular method that I use for testing the saunas.
It tests everything, not just half of the EMF.
We’re testing body voltage, magnetic fields, electric fields and RF radiation.
Saunas that are super luxurious and have smart phone controllers and all kinds of fancy stuff.
Usually those won’t qualify because the RF radiation is pretty high.
It’s almost like sitting next to a WiFi router.
That’s normally not something you want to see in a healing environment or something like that.
Let me fix this a little bit.
Is that better?
Or is that better?
I don’t know.
I might screw this up.
This is not my normal environment for making the videos.
Anyway, the other thing is I took some flack last year for only having one recommendation.
I was only making one sauna recommendation.
At the end of the day, we all don’t all necessarily want or need the exact same thing.
At first, I was resistant to this and I didn’t agree.
But after some time, I could see where people were coming from.
After I worked with more people, I could see the need to have different options for different situations.
Some people wanted an outdoor sauna.
Some people wanted an indoor sauna.
Some people wanted a sauna that could withstand elements and have a cover.
A lot of sauna companies didn’t offer those.
There’s a lot of unique variables that need options in order to service people better.
That was one of the things.
People said that I was biased because I was only making one recommendation.
In hindsight, maybe in some context, they were right.
Now, I have multiple options that are vetted by me.
We’re not relying on any of this third-party testing stuff because that was a huge deal.
One of the reasons that I wouldn’t recommend other saunas is because I hadn’t been in them.
I think that people that recommend saunas that they’ve never been in before are doing you a disservice.
If you haven’t stepped foot in the thing, you shouldn’t really be talking to people about whether it’s good or whether it’s bad.
A lot of people make these videos or reviews without first-hand experience.
That’s pretty misleading, especially when you’re a person that’s about to make a $5,000 purchase decision.
You really don’t want to base that choice on advice that really isn’t tried and true.
Now, I’ve vetted a bunch of different saunas.
We’ve picked the cream of the crop.
We know for a fact that those are rock-solid recommendations.
I’ve tested them multiple times.
We’ve got live videos for all that stuff.
Everything is good.
Tons of people still email me to this day asking if certain types of EMF are harmful or not.
Honestly, I don’t even get into debates about this anymore because it’s just a waste of time.
It doesn’t really even matter anymore.
The whole point of the certified sauna list is so that we could avoid wasting time doing all this stuff.
If there are saunas that are out there that don’t have any of it, why aren’t we using them?
That’s my whole thing.
People want to continue to ask me my thoughts about the different types of EMF and this and that and the other.
It’s really kind of a pointless conversation.
We’re wasting time debating this or that when we could just choose a sauna that eliminates all that stuff altogether just by the design of it.
It just doesn’t exist.
It would be silly not to.
That was the start of the certified sauna list.
All the certified saunas are low EMF tested by me personally.
They’re complete low EMF, not just half low EMF.
A lot of complaints out there about saunas saying that they’re low EMF, but then they get a meter on them.
There are certain types of EMF that are still present there that weren’t previously disclosed or this, that and the other.
People get really bent out of shape when that happens.
All the certified sauna brands, it doesn’t matter what it is, it will never be allowed on the list if they’re not low ELF, which is low electric fields, low body voltage.
You can’t have low body voltage without having low electric fields, period.
Low RF radiation, which is Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, all that stuff.
And low magnetic fields.
All four of those definitely have to test and they have to meet a standard.
I can tell you what the standard is if you want to know.
A lot of people just get bogged down by the numbers.
I get emails all the time that so and so sauna company said that a cell phone has an EMF level of 20, but their sauna only has an EMF level of 10.
This is like an apples to oranges comparison and they’re just using trickery or tomfoolery to try to make it seem like it’s not what it really is.
A cell phone is emitting RF radiation and the levels that are safe for you to be around for any length of time are different than magnetic fields or electric fields, which are what the EMF levels are usually being emitted in a sauna, which is a completely different type of EMF.
And that also has a different level that’s within reason or within a safety guidelines for you to be exposed to for any length of time.
So you can’t just say that a cell phone has 20 and their sauna has 10, so it must be safe, let’s buy it.
They’re trying to do a bait and switch there and they’re trying to push, push, push until you just give up because you don’t understand it and just buy the damn thing.
Well, it’s doing you a disservice, but I’ll just tell you what they are.
So for me, the certified sauna standards are in the seated position, because a lot of people can go in a sauna and generate low levels and take pictures of it and you think it’s low EMF.
But basically, in the seated position where your body is, everything has to be under 1 mG magnetic fields.
Also has to be under 200 volts per meter in electric fields.
Also has to be under 200 mV of body voltage and there also has to be little to no RF radiation at all.
I will not compromise on the RF radiation.
If you put a smartphone controller in the roof right over your head and it’s not foil lined with a reflective sheeting to reflect those away from your brain, I will not make the list.
I won’t test it, don’t bother.
If you’re a sauna company out there, do not bother contacting me, you’re wasting both of our time and it’s better for you if you just do your own thing and do your own marketing and stay away from what this is geared toward.
But for you guys to know, so under 200 volts per meter electric fields, under 1 mG, under 200 mV of body voltage or 0.2 volts and little to no RF radiation.
I mean hardly any.
There’s a couple different ways you can measure RF.
It’s very confusing if we start laying out one and then somebody comes in with a different meter and is not clarifying that like watts per meter squared is a lot different than volts per meter.
However, basically what we’ve got is a list of saunas that are low EMF across the board and that are safe for kids.
I mean I get emails and phone calls all the time from parents that are trying to help their kids with autism.
They’ve got Lyme disease or they’ve got different types of things that they’re battling and they’re trying to improve their health.
The last thing that these parents want to do or even the people themselves that are trying to heal themselves is stick themselves into an environment that’s not conducive to making that happen as quickly as possible.
So it’s debatable whether or not if you sit in a sauna, we use the jargon like sit in a hot box, basically sit in a sauna 20 minutes to 40 minutes a day for 4 to 6 days a week.
If you’re spending 6 hours in a sauna a week, it’s debatable whether a certain threshold of EMF levels will increase the stress on your nervous system or cause things to be more difficult for you than they need to be or just really aren’t conducive to providing you with the most healing or beneficial environment possible.
That is debatable but the thing is if you have children or if your health is really crippled or you’re doing these things, there’s not a huge price difference between getting a sauna that doesn’t have any of this stuff and getting one that does.
So I mean we’re talking like $500, $600 bucks.
So in the grand scheme of things, for something that you’re going to buy and have for a long time, there’s really no reason to compromise on this stuff and that is why certified saunas came about.
That’s why this exists and that’s the whole point of it is to have a list of personally vetted saunas where there’s no question.
It’s not like the example I gave from the lady that called last week that said, “Hey Matt, I’m talking to so and so sauna company and they say that the cell phone is 20, the sauna is 10.
Is that safe?”
This is a complete bait and switch.
Why not have a list that is vetted on live video from a person that actually cares about this stuff and has like it doesn’t matter.
The saunas either pass or they don’t.
And for the people out there that think that, “Oh, some sauna company could just pay for placement and get their sauna included in the list.”
Well, they’re not going to pass the live video test.
So the whole point of having all this stuff documented is so that if for some reason you doubt the legitimacy or the honesty of the certified saunas list, you can just go watch the videos.
I mean it’s the same set of meters that are calibrated exactly the same for all the saunas.
So if something is amiss, I mean you’re going to know about it.
The only thing that I will say is that sometimes there is a slight compromise on some of the EMF stuff.
People who don’t really know what they’re looking at will not understand that in the seated position we could have a different EMF level than underneath the bench on the floor where the power supply is located.
You may have a higher electric field or magnetic field down there.
But you’ve got to understand, I mean that’s 24 inches away from the seat and your body is never going to be in contact with that.
So if you see certain things in the sauna and it’s not a measurement taken in the seated position, understand what you’re looking at.
Take those things with a grain of salt.
Learn how EMF drops off with distance because distance is your friend.
But these particular saunas are the lowest of all low EMF saunas on the planet.
And don’t be fooled by people out there that say that a sauna is low EMF when they’re only testing for one thing.
Because EMF levels are comprised of three things in any sauna.
Any sauna can have RF radiation from Bluetooth or Wi-Fi, can have magnetic fields from the heaters and the power supply, can have electric fields from the wiring, different types of control panels, sometimes even the lighting in the ceiling has electric and magnetic fields.
So there’s a bunch of different things you have to test for and that’s the point of certified saunas.
Making it simple, making the options vetted and so on and so forth.
Now, other people have asked, you know, why did I switch from recommending just one sauna to multiple options?
Well, because there’s just too many situations where I wasn’t able to service people correctly or the best that I could.
And I thought going forward it’s a good idea to have more than one option.
Number one, sometimes people want a sauna like yesterday and things go out of stock.
And I have no control over that.
No one has any control over that.
So sometimes people are willing to compromise and go with a different brand because they need it now, right?
And so you can’t, there’s never going to be, I don’t ever want to get into a situation again where there’s a complete lack of availability.
And you know, we’re scheduling delivery for saunas like six months from now or something like that.
And there’s no other recommendation on the blog or there’s no other sauna on the planet that could possibly help these people and they could get it quicker.
That just, you know, in hindsight that wasn’t the best way to do things.
And it’s a good idea to have more than one option, both for you guys and for me.
So that there, you know, if something happens to one, you know, there’s another option.
Because thousands of people need saunas for all different types of reasons.
And so, you know, if somebody’s healthy or they’re an athlete or they’re a triathlete or something like that and they’re prepping for an event next year or whatever, they may only have so many months that they need to get in a sauna.
And you know, if there’s a pro and a con to one model but it’s available now, it might be worth it to them to go ahead and take that so they can get their training in and be prepared for the event.
Versus somebody else that has children and really wants, you know, nitpicky stuff or this, that, and the other.
For them it wouldn’t be worth it and they’d want to wait or, you know, go with a different brand or this, that, and the other.
So there’s different options for different people but all of them are super low EMF.
That’s the most important thing to me.
And so really that was number one is have other options.
Number two, shipping to other countries.
I mean I can’t tell you how many times last year that I would get calls or emails or, you know, whatever.
Somebody’s in the UK, somebody’s in, you know, Australia, somebody’s in New Zealand, somebody’s in Europe, in different countries.
I had a guy from Israel, I had a guy from, man, all kinds of obscure countries and I couldn’t help him.
And the sauna companies that I was working with, they couldn’t help him because they just didn’t operate in those areas.
So now, you know, we’ve got to have at least one certified sauna on the list that ships to other countries or can at least make a special request and handle, you know, custom shipping.
Even if it’s really expensive.
I mean at the end of the day if the people really want it, let them pay and let them get it.
And, you know, if a certain sauna company isn’t willing to offer that but another one is, you know, we need to take them up on that so that these people can get the equipment that they need, you know, to improve their health.
And so third point is financing.
This was a big one.
My number one request last year was financing.
And so we had a hard time to help people get 0% interest credit cards and do like a 0% for 24 months or something like that.
There just weren’t financing options for everyone.
And so now what we’ve done is added saunas to the list that have financing options that are good that almost everyone can qualify for.
So even if, you know, you might not get the sauna that you like the look of the best, at least there’s a low EMF safe healthy choice on there that you can get financing for.
So that was a really big thing.
That’s probably a huge–that’s probably one of the number one drivers or the components of having multiple options with good financing because that’s really, really important.
Not everybody can just go out and plop down money for, you know, a sauna yet they really need it.
So if they don’t get it, you know, they can–going to continue to struggle with their health.
So that’s a very important piece to the puzzle.
So that’s pretty much the back story.
That’s pretty much a good overview of how we got to this point, why the sauna recommendations are expanding.
And this doesn’t mean–right now there’s three saunas on the list.
It’s the Radiant Health, the Clear Light, Premier, and the High Tech Health TR2 or the Transcend.
And those are all the lowest EMF saunas available on the market, period, in 2019.
Now it doesn’t mean that I won’t expand that and add more of the–than just the three.
Because there’s a couple of things that I’m not doing right now as good as I could be.
And I’m working on trying to come up with a solution.
I just can’t find one right now.
One thing is for people that are in really small apartments, like when I started the blog Clever Leverage, I moved to a 500 square foot apartment.
It was a studio apartment just to reduce expenses so that I could start a new passion project and a new business and not have to worry about big overhead and things like that.
And I talk to people every day that are in these situations and they just don’t have room for a big wooden sauna, right?
And so I’m really trying my hardest to find a small portable sauna tent that is low EMF.
I just can’t find it.
So there may be a compromise.
I’ve tested a bunch of them.
There’s one that’s kind of lower than all the rest, but it still has magnetic fields in it of 5 to 7 milligauss, which is not within my threshold.
I’m also very against sauna tents because I’m a taller, bigger person, so they’re just not comfortable for me.
I don’t like them.
I don’t like using them.
I don’t like being in the tent with my arms and my head sticking out.
But I do recognize that in some situations, both for space requirements, for price, and for portability, for people that are traveling and things like that, and this is their only option, there may have to be a compromise there on my part.
We may have to have an addendum.
We won’t make the certified sauna list because it won’t be as low EMF as the certified saunas, but we may have to have an option there that is a compromise on a little higher EMF but a cheap portable sauna that if that’s the only thing you can afford or fit, that would be the thing that you would use for 6 to 15 months or so until you can save or move to another place or accommodate something else.
The other thing is outdoor saunas.
We’ve got to have an option for outdoor saunas.
Sometimes people just don’t have space inside.
They’ve got a big family.
There’s literally no room.
They don’t have a basement.
They don’t have anything.
And so the list may expand, but as of right now, it’s just the three, and these are the three best saunas in the world that I’ve personally tested out of 13 brands of saunas now.
And so let’s just go over a couple.
I know this is what people really want to know, the Radiant Health.
Why is it ranked number one?
Well, it’s ranked number one because it tested the best, plain and simple.
It has the lowest EMF out of every sauna that I’ve ever been in, period.
It has the lowest magnetic fields, electric fields, body voltage, zero to RF radiation.
They don’t put Wi-Fi, no Bluetooth in there, so there’s none.
It’s also the easiest sauna that I’ve ever put together.
So that just happened by chance.
I mean it could have been the most difficult.
It could have not.
I have nothing to do with that.
It’s just that’s also a huge selling point for people.
You know, how hard is this thing to put together?
Are we going to be able to do it?
Do we need special tools?
How long is it going to take?
Can we carry the thing inside?
So I have a complete assembly video that shows me receiving the sauna.
I do this for every sauna, by the way.
Me receiving the sauna from the box truck.
You can see what it’s like when I break down the pallet in the garage.
I carry the pieces in.
I put it together step by step, and you can follow all along.
I don’t know why the manufacturers don’t do this.
It’s pretty ridiculous that they don’t.
But I film everything, so you don’t have to worry about it.
You can just watch the installation tutorials.
But the Radiant Health sauna is the easiest sauna ever to put together.
The build quality is excellent.
It’s got all the little features that you’ll want.
It’s got a heated bench.
It’s got delayed start.
That’s another reason.
It made the number one list too because everyone wants delayed start, but no one wants a Wi-Fi controller to connect the sauna to the Internet, and then you’ve got Wi-Fi in the roof beaming down at your head in order to set the sauna to come on at a certain time when you get home.
Now you can just walk up to the sauna, don’t have to connect it to the Internet or anything, and just hit the delayed start, set the number of hours, and then when you come home it’s on.
If the Internet goes out or anything like that, it doesn’t affect the sauna not working.
It just handles it on its own, which is awesome.
That’s pretty much the three reasons why that one is ranked number one, and I just like it.
It’s very comfortable.
I think what you get for the price, it’s not much more money than most of the other saunas.
I mean some of the other saunas from last year are more expensive for a similar size model than the Radiant, so it’s really just the best choice all around for most people.
And that brings us to number two.
Number two ranked was the Clearlight Premier.
One more thing, the Radiant and the Clearlight have the ceramic tile in the floor, so you never have to worry about sweat dripping down or anything like that.
A lot of people are concerned with either staining the wood or cleaning it or getting bacteria, this, that, and the other.
That’s a really nice feature that both of those have.
So I just wanted to throw that in there.
But the number two sauna is the Clearlight Premier.
Also super low EMF, very similar to the Radiant Health, a little bit of design characteristics.
They also offer different lumber for the Clearlight, so if you wanted cedar or something like that, there’s an option for that too.
Some people are hell-bent on certain things, or they’ve been guided by a doctor or a functional medicine doctor or something like that, naturopath, and they really want certain stuff, or maybe they have skin allergies and they can’t have cedar because it’s an irritant, and they go with basswood or poplar or hemlock or something like that.
But the biggest thing for the Clearlight is flexibility.
Clearlight’s probably the most flexible for people that need financing.
Their financing options are really good.
They also ship to other countries, which is huge.
We talked about that earlier.
And they have outdoor options.
That was one of the things that was lacking last year, is people liked the saunas, but it just didn’t fit with the environment or with their needs.
So it was very important to have good options for that.
And then finally, the number three ranked sauna is the Hitech Health Transcend model.
Super low EMF sauna for a ceramic sauna.
Usually ceramic saunas have high magnetic fields because you can’t mitigate them.
But in the Hitech Health, they’ve done a pretty good job with that.
It tests very, very well.
Build quality is great.
And so it is the only ceramic sauna on the certified saunas list.
None of the others tested well enough to be placed on the list.
And so a lot of people with different types of chemical sensitivities, they’re working with naturopaths or functional medicine doctors.
Some of these guys insist that the people use a particular ceramic sauna for some type of treatment or this, that, and the other.
I don’t necessarily believe that you have to have one over the other in order to get the benefit from infrared, as long as it’s far infrared mostly.
But at the same time, I don’t want to stop somebody from getting a piece of equipment that’s going to help themselves just because I have an opinion about something.
So it was very important to have both carbon and ceramic sauna options on the certified saunas list.
And I finally found one that has low electric fields, low body voltage, no RF radiation, and low magnetic fields.
And so you will see in the EMF testing videos, if you test the front heaters in the Hitech Health, there are some hot spots for magnetic fields, but they do dissipate with distance by the time it gets to your knees and these other things.
You’ll have to watch the complete review video for each sauna to see that stuff.
There’s also assembly videos for every single one, Hitech Health, Clearlight, and the Radiant Health.
And there’s also coupon codes for all these saunas.
They should all get you around $500 off.
I think the coupon code is mattjustice500.
That’s pretty much everywhere.
If you watch the installation videos or the review videos, you’ll see it.
And if you go to the list of certified saunas blog post on cleverleverage.com, you can also get the direct phone number with the point of contact that I bought the sauna from.
And all these people are vetted, and they know not to be high pressure, not to give you a hard time.
These are the same exact people that I bought the saunas from, so I know that there will be a good experience with them.
I don’t like all this jazz where you hand over your contact information and blah, blah, blah.
And then the people just hound the absolute shit out of you for weeks or months until you buy something.
It’s just ridiculous.
It doesn’t need to be like that.
And then, so pricing.
The final point is pricing.
Look, guys, I can’t keep up with the pricing.
Every time I turn around, somebody’s having a sale.
Usually, they have sales every two months.
There is some fear-mongering going on with some sauna companies.
I don’t know if it’s any of these three or not just because I don’t do sales for them, so I wouldn’t know.
But as a general rule, all of them have sauna options in the $3,000 to $5,000 range and everywhere in between.
So if you’re looking for a cheaper one-person, small, one-person basswood or something like that, that should be in the low threes from the majority of the companies.
Some of them are more expensive.
Like the Hitech Health is a little more expensive than the other two.
But the Radiant Health and the Clearlight Premier have good options in the low threes for a one-person sauna.
And then they go out from there.
I mean it could be $3,500 to $4,000 for a two-person.
Clearlight has a different price if you want a different type of wood finish.
One might be $3,500, might be $4,100 if you want something fancy.
You have to choose your options.
And so don’t kill me if the prices are $200 off from what I’m telling you if you see this video six months or six years from now because there’s no way to edit the YouTube videos and I can’t keep track of the pricing changes.
It’s just a range and it’s usually pretty close.
And then some of the companies, some sauna companies will charge for shipping.
Some of them will subsidize it in the price and give you free shipping.
But it’s coming from somewhere.
You’ve got to be realistic about this.
It’s a giant pallet that we’re shipping across the country.
So it’s not going to get there for free, that’s for sure.
It’s usually pretty expensive.
They weigh about 300 pounds most of the time.
And also, whatever you buy, whatever’s right for you, I urge you to watch my installation videos because I show you how to take the pallet apart outside.
I do not recommend carrying the boxes of saunas in the house.
I recommend unpackaging them in your garage.
Or if you’re in an apartment, do it in your parking space and then carry the individual pieces in.
Make sure you don’t break anything and also keep all the mess, any dust, any cardboard, any particle stuff out of your house.
You don’t want to drag that stuff in there.
I hope this was helpful for you guys.
I tried to compile points about all the different sauna recommendations and sort of address them at once.
I’m going to do individual videos for each little thing after this.
But I’m going to go ahead and enjoy a little bit of snow here in Grandma’s cabin.
And I’ll see you in tomorrow’s video.
If you guys have anything else that you’d like to know, let me know in the comments and I’ll add it for next week’s Q.
See you guys.