What kind of Generator to get to keep lights on?

It sort of depends on what your goal is. Do you want to operate as normal, or are you ok with just necessities? We have a few different generators, mostly used for running RVs while boondocking. BUT, I had a few years of using a wholesale energy provider where we needed to basically shut the whole house down in the hottest portion of a Texas summer. If you’re wanting to operate ‘business as usual’, then yea, a generac wired into your house is the way to go. If you’re operating on a ‘necessities only, cheaper is better’, that’s a lot more wiggle room. We use a predator 4500, primarily. Less than $1,000 from harbor freight, decently quiet (still loud!) and can run a full load for most of the day off a tank of gas (5 gallons, of memory serves). I’ll just cover the ‘at home’ usage as opposed to RV, and how we utilized it during the summer, but we would relegate our living space to one area, closing off other rooms via heavy curtains or doors. We would run one AC unit for that area, and charge devices while we ran the gennie. We reserved a few hours a day to run the fridge/freezer, and would only open when it was getting power. Freezers will maintain temp for 3 days, fridges for roughly 24 when not being opened, so a few hours a day was generally enough, although the fridge loses temp MUCH faster. A lot of it comes down to how much you’re wanting to run, and how much fuel you’re willing to store. On the predator 4500, we could run an RV, with fridge and AC during the summer for about 24 hours on 5 gallons of fuel. There are probably things we could have done to mitigate that, but we weren’t trying and we had pets in the RV and wouldn’t make them suffer while we were out. If I was trying to conserve fuel: I would freeze multiple water bottles while the generator was running and move them to the fridge to keep temp colder. Rechargeable fans to use while the gennie was off or to be able to run the AC at a higher temp and still stay comfortable. In cold temps, obviously layer up, sleep in a tent or a blanket fort with the whole family (during the Texas ice storm, one of the most heart breaking stories was a child that died in his sleep, could have been prevented if he had slept in his parents bed), pack bricks around your heat source to charge with a little heat before banking your fire or shutting down your heater.