Utility Bills

[Tom Bender]

Malcolm's trials with electricity costs has me feeling very lucky.

Here in Michigan we have very few outages and the cost is low. Our house is a 1300 sq ft ranch plus a full basement. A large garage and nice outdoor areas make it very livable for two. We run heat and A/C at comfortable levels and don't spare the lights. No sliding glass doors, no skylights, no fireplace, no heat sucking second floor plus good windows and doors make it tight.

Our gas and electric bills are each under $1,000/year.

BTW we have a 1985 gas furnace, it runs well and has passed recent inspection. One new electronic module and a new gas valve in 34 years. I don't think a high efficiency furnace could pay for itself if it ran for 100 years.

[Brian Elfert]

My electric rates are just over 12 cents a KWH which is right about the national average. I was spending about $800 on electricity per year before I got solar. Right now, I have a $400 credit on my electric bill, but my solar is not generating enough right now cover my usage so the credit is getting eaten up. I should be back to near full production in March as the snow melts quickly and a lot more sun by then. My natural gas bill is right about $600. I have a high efficiency furnace as the house didn't have a furnace when I bought it.

My house has new Andersen windows and doors plus spray foam in the attic so very efficient. It is one story, but I am not sure that is more efficient than a two story.

Edit: forgot to mention my house is 1,300 square feet with detached garage. I don't think the power has gone out even once a year in five years. It helps that the city I live in has required underground power lines for many years.

[Jim Becker]

Our energy use is quite a bit higher than yours, Tom. Some of that is because it's a much larger home (4200 sq ft) with two HVAC systems, on-site well and pumped septic and two young adults who, um...are not necessarily frugal, although they have gotten a lot better. My shop also contributes, but since installing the Mini-Split, it's now negligible even with full time use compared to what heating with resistance cost for "only when I'm out there" part time use. The other piece is that our local electric and natural gas rates are what they are. If I had to mentally average our monthly electric/gas bill, I'd say it would be close to $400-450 a month "on average", but fluctuates between a low of about $300 up to as much as $600. That's lower than it was a few years ago because of replacing the well pump and the changes to my shop system already mentioned. Our outages last about 15 seconds...we have a whole house generation system which gets action more often that we would prefer simply because electric utilities are aerial around here and wind happens.

[John K Jordan]

Malcolm's trials with electricity costs has me feeling very lucky.

Here in Michigan we have very few outages and the cost is low. Our house is a 1300 sq ft ranch plus a full basement. A large garage and nice outdoor areas make it very livable for two. We run heat and A/C at comfortable levels and don't spare the lights. No sliding glass doors, no skylights, no fireplace, no heat sucking second floor plus good windows and doors make it tight.

Our gas and electric bills are each under $1,000/year.


My story is more like Jim's, some months up to about $500 for electricity, no natural gas here. But we have a two story timber frame house with skylights. Also, a 24x62 shop building with heat pumps in both buildings. Farm lights around shop and barn, nine electric heaters all winter for livestock water tubs and poultry waterers.

When we lived in the city of Oak Ridge power outages were so frequent I bought a generator. Out in the country now I can count the power outages in 15 years on one hand and most were very brief, just a minute or two. (A few years ago I did have a 7200volt line up to our transformer that developed a pinhole and had to be dug up and repaired - power was out for a few hours that time!)

JKJ

[Jerome Stanek]

I have a 1600 Sq ft house and a 1700 sq ft shop electric averages $100 a month and heat about $60 a month live just south of Cleveland in the secondary snow belt.

[Frank Pratt]

We pay $.05/kwh here and power outages are very rare and usually not more than a few seconds when they do occur. Part of me wants to have solar, a Power Wall, and a backup generator, but the economics just aren't there.

[Lisa Starr]

Our home is very old (circa 1838) around 1500 sq feet, Cape style. We also heat 2 outbuildings 576 sq ft and 728 sq ft. House is insulated to about R14, since that was all the room there is for insulation. Outbuildings have 5-1/2" walls filled with blown cellulose and ceilings with approximately 24" of cellulose. Home and both buildings are heated with Wall Hung boilers and radiant floor heat. Our yearly natural gas usage is about 750 ccf and we have 5400 heating degree days. Our electrical usage is much higher, but we choose to operate a "Crawl Space" dehumidifier year around in the basement.

[Mike Henderson]

I track our utility costs on spreadsheets and have a history back about 8 or 9 years (when we moved into this house). Our average annual cost is:

Electricity = about $200/year. We installed solar part way through so it makes the average a bit difficult to figure. Without solar it was about $1,000 year. The electric company keeps changing the rate structure. In the beginning with our solar we were zeroed out.
Natural gas = $208/year
Water = $1,705/year Irrigating the lawn, trees, and plants keeps this costs high.

Mike

[Bob Turkovich]

Here in Michigan we have very few outages and the cost is not low. Our house is a 1950 sq ft ranch plus a full basement. A large garage and nice outdoor areas make it very livable for three. We run heat and A/C at comfortable levels and don't spare the lights. One sliding glass door, no skylights, one gas fireplace, no heat sucking second floor plus good windows and doors make it tight.

Our gas bill is under $1,000/year. Our electric bill is about $2600/year.

BTW we have a 2003 gas furnace, it runs well and has passed recent inspection.

Tom, are you available to talk to my wife and daughter? :p

[Kev Williams]

According to our PoCo's website I'm paying 10c per kW. Our place is essentially identical to Tom's, except the garage isn't all that big, and for the past 6 years it's been part of our engraving shop. Last I counted there were 81 4' florescent tubes lighting up the garage and basement, which is all shop. In 2018 our equal pay power bill was $562 a month. Since then I've changed out quite a few florescent tubes to LED's, been keeping more lights and equipment off when not needed, and what turned out to be a huge help, replaced a cracked water separator that was attached to my big air compressor that I didn't realize was leaking so bad (compressor is in shed outside). Our bill this year went down to $455...

Heat, hot water and cooking are all natural gas. Furnace is a Goodman 110k BTU that replaced a 140k Airtemp about 15 years ago. I hear bad things about Goodman but from the moment it went in our gas usage dropped near 30%. The way it works wastes very little heat, very efficient for an 80%er... The garage shop I heat with an NG fired ventless 22k btu wall heater. Our NG equal-pay bill is only $54 a month, even with all the original 53 year old windows. But many years ago my old man had the attic topped off with about 18" of blown glass, and it does help. But a big reason our gas bill is so low is because of all the engraving equipment, when the machines and computers are working they're putting out heat! Being slow the past week I haven't had to use the machines in the garage much, and with them off I noticed the garage stays around 62° with the outdoors at around 28°, but with 4 machines active, the temp hovers around 67°. The basement is noticeably cooler with all the machinery off too. So the electric bill DOES help lower the gas bill.

The only utility complaint I have is the ridiculous water bill, it's over $120 a month. But we got really really nice curb & gutter and street lighting around town... ;)

[Charlie Velasquez]

Mike, Kev, is that your water bill only, or water and sewage?

[Lisa Starr]

Forgot to include my water/sewer in my prior post. No complaints there, it is $425.00/year for the pair. Now, if my electric would be reasonable,...

[Mike Henderson]

Mike, Kev, is that your water bill only, or water and sewage?

I'm not absolutely sure, but I think we pay sewage as part of our property tax bill. I'm pretty sure it's not included on the water bill. I'd have to go look up my property tax bill to be sure.

Mike

[Tom Bender]

Here in Michigan we have very few outages and the cost is not low. Our house is a 1950 sq ft ranch plus a full basement. A large garage and nice outdoor areas make it very livable for three. We run heat and A/C at comfortable levels and don't spare the lights. One sliding glass door, no skylights, one gas fireplace, no heat sucking second floor plus good windows and doors make it tight.

Our gas bill is under $1,000/year. Our electric bill is about $2600/year.

BTW we have a 2003 gas furnace, it runs well and has passed recent inspection.

Tom, are you available to talk to my wife and daughter? :p

Bob I'm guessing that you have an electric water heater and stove. And a couple of electric hair dryers and maybe some electric heat.

[Osvaldo Cristo]

I live in the suburbs of Sao Paulo, Brazil. Our home is only 12 km from Tropic of Capricorn. Living at 800 m of altitude we have an agreeable temperature most of the years but with peaks above 30 degrees C and below 10 degrees Celsius for a few days a year.

Our home has around 3300 square foot. The house is planned for energy efficiency at some degree but we do not have solar energy or rain water collection.

Our electricity bill is around 1,200 USD a year, gas around 250 USD and water and sewage is 200 USD. Four adults living here. I expect the bills will decrease something as our children will not live here next year.

[ChrisA Edwards]

We are about 4950 sq/ft, 3 levels, the third being a finished attic. We have 3 zones, one for each floor. The main floor is gas heat, while the second floor and attic are electric heat pump. We can close off the second floor and the attic so we only heat and cool as necessary. So my wife and I basically live on the ground floor, about 2000sq/ft.

I have a two story standalone 30x30 garage with window heat pumps/AC on each floor. I use the heat and AC occasionally when out there.

Electricity runs about $240 during the summer months and gas is negligible.

Winter, our gas runs about $200 depending upon how cold it gets.

Water is always around $40 per month as we are on city water but septic sewer.

House is 20 years old.

[Bruce Wrenn]

Every month local electric supplier sends out a report of how my usage compared with others. Their average house is only 1500 sq ft. Ours is right at 3000 sq ft, with detached shop (24 X 28.) We also have a booster pump for well that supplies water to two house and church next door. Well pump itself is on a separate meter, or at least it used to be till power company wanted $30+ a month just for meter. Without meter charge, bill for pump was around $4.00 a month. Despite being almost twice the size of comparable homes, we usually only use about $15 more than average. We heat water, dry clothes, and cook on propane. Last year replaced TWO 30+ year old heat pumps, and bill is almost $50 lower per month than before. Right now power company projects my current bill to be $134 for Dec 15 - Jan 15. One, 280 gallon tank of propane does the whole year most years.

[Kev Williams]

Mike, Kev, is that your water bill only, or water and sewage?
For me, seems they're charging for everything they can get away with-
422669
this is 'equal pay' too...

[Jim Becker]

Every month local electric supplier sends out a report of how my usage compared with others. Their average house is only 1500 sq ft. Ours is right at 3000 sq ft, with detached shop (24 X 28.) We also have a booster pump for well that supplies water to two house and church next door. Well pump itself is on a separate meter, or at least it used to be till power company wanted $30+ a month just for meter. Without meter charge, bill for pump was around $4.00 a month. Despite being almost twice the size of comparable homes, we usually only use about $15 more than average. We heat water, dry clothes, and cook on propane. Last year replaced TWO 30+ year old heat pumps, and bill is almost $50 lower per month than before. Right now power company projects my current bill to be $134 for Dec 15 - Jan 15. One, 280 gallon tank of propane does the whole year most years.

PECO sends me a similar love note every month. Unlike yours, our usage is twice the normal for our "neighbors". They have got to be freezing or baking and don't take showers since we are conservative on our temperatures (68ºF heating/74ºF cooling), don't leave lights burning (and have all LED with a few CFL and LV Halogen) and have on-demand hot water.

[Al Launier]

Comparing Notes (NH):
4,100 Sq.Ft. House, Artesian Well 425' deep-3/4 HP pump-20 GPM
Utility Eversource $.0939/KWH-$2791/yr.
20KW Kohler Standby Generator (Propane)-very infrequent outages-typically hour(s), had a 5 day outage (before Standby Generator :()
#6 Fuel Oil 1100 gal-$2.699/gal-$2968/yr.
Propane 100 gal/3 tanks (backup only)-$1.679/Gal-$168/yr.

[Mike Cutler]

Connecticut's rates are very high. They also make the bill as confusing as they can to read, to hide how everything is calculated and assessed. You have to break the bill down into two categories, Generation and Transmission and Distribution. Then add in all of the taxes and fees. I haven't looked lately but total KW/HR is probably right at 20 cents.
Our house is electric heat, but you would go broke heating a house with electric heat alone in Connecticut. We actually rely on a Quadrafire 5700 and 4-5 cords of wood per winter. My electric bill actually goes down in the winter.
Two things keep my bill high; A dehumidifier continuously runs in the basement, unless the wood stove is going. And we have parrots in a dedicated room that is electric baseboard heat. Get rid of those two loads and my bill would be under $100.00/month.
Appliances, stovetop and oven,dryer, and water heater, are propane. We average18-20 gallons of propane each month.
Curbside trash pickup is $27.00/month.

One thing I have noticed through the years is that the people that try to keep their houses "cool" in the winter and "warm" in the summer to save money, are also ones that seem to be sick the most at work with every bug that goes around, especially in winter. It has been years since I've had a cold or flu bug. The ones trying to keep their houses at 62-64 through the winter are always sick at work. Just an observation.

[Darcy Warner]

My shop is about 8k a year for electricity, don't pay attention to my house, it seems cheap whatever it is.

[Kev Williams]

Every month local electric supplier sends out a report of how my usage compared with others. Their average house is only 1500 sq ft. Ours is right at 3000 sq ft, with detached shop (24 X 28.) We also have a booster pump for well that supplies water to two house and church next door. Well pump itself is on a separate meter, or at least it used to be till power company wanted $30+ a month just for meter. Without meter charge, bill for pump was around $4.00 a month. Despite being almost twice the size of comparable homes, we usually only use about $15 more than average. We heat water, dry clothes, and cook on propane. Last year replaced TWO 30+ year old heat pumps, and bill is almost $50 lower per month than before. Right now power company projects my current bill to be $134 for Dec 15 - Jan 15. One, 280 gallon tank of propane does the whole year most years.

PECO sends me a similar love note every month. Unlike yours, our usage is twice the normal for our "neighbors". They have got to be freezing or baking and don't take showers since we are conservative on our temperatures (68ºF heating/74ºF cooling), don't leave lights burning (and have all LED with a few CFL and LV Halogen) and have on-demand hot water.
Here's one of my 'love notes'-
422690
Fortunately, we make the name badges for several police departments, so at least THEY know we don't have some underground cave filled with metal halide lights ;)
What I find amusing is that the power company considers our usage 'FAIR' :D

[Charlie Velasquez]

I'm not absolutely sure, but I think we pay sewage as part of our property tax bill. I'm pretty sure it's not included on the water bill. I'd have to go look up my property tax bill to be sure.

Mike

Sewage bill is often a function of your water bill, the more water you use the higher your sewage bill. So, the municipality often has the water company do the billing for them. In our community the sewage rate is almost twice the water rate. Those property owners that have a pool or do a lot of irrigating are buying a lot of water that never goes down the sewer.

Talk with your water company. For a couple hundred dollars they may put in a deduct meter for one of your outside faucets. If you plumb your irrigation/pool to use that water point the water company will bill you for the water, but deduct it from your sewage bill.
Not all utility companies do this, but if they do and you had, for instance, a pool, and you can sweat copper pipe, it pays for itself quickly..

[Jason Roehl]

One thing I have noticed through the years is that the people that try to keep their houses "cool" in the winter and "warm" in the summer to save money, are also ones that seem to be sick the most at work with every bug that goes around, especially in winter. It has been years since I've had a cold or flu bug. The ones trying to keep their houses at 62-64 through the winter are always sick at work. Just an observation.

That's funny. I see the exact opposite. I'm one who keeps the house cold in the winter, and barely tolerable in the summer (cool--76°F, but I would turn that temp down if it weren't so expensive), yet we don't often get sick in our house. At work, everyone else is sick all the time, but they like their offices hot (to me). I'll walk in to fix something, immediately starting pouring sweat, and they'll complain it's cold in there.

As for utilities, we're about 2000 s.f. in a bi-level (garage part of basement level), range about $200/mo electric in summer to $120/mo winter (around $0.13/kWh), natural gas is about $40/mo summer to about $200 for the coldest month. Thermostat is set to 65°F while we're home in the winter, and 62°F while we're gone, then 60°F at night. A/C is on to 76°F in the summer any time the dew point exceeds 60°F (often). In the spring and fall, we open the windows as much as we can, provided the outside temperature is in the direction we want to go, and the humidity isn't too high.

[Rod Sheridan]

Hi, I live in a 4 bedroom end unit 2 story townhouse.

We use 500 to 600 KWh per month, which is about $80 per month.

We have a 3 tier time of use rate.......Rod

[Jim Koepke]

What I find amusing is that the power company considers our usage 'FAIR' :D

It is a politically correct grading system so as to not quash your self esteem. :eek:

jtk

[Tom Bender]

422690


Holy moly Ken, How many employees do you have in that shop?

[Curt Harms]

I'm not absolutely sure, but I think we pay sewage as part of our property tax bill. I'm pretty sure it's not included on the water bill. I'd have to go look up my property tax bill to be sure.

Mike

Here sewer bill though separate from the water bill is based on water usage. That's a reasonable way to do it because this area doesn't do much in the way of irrigation. Areas that do irrigation like your area would be pretty inequitable if sewer were based on water usage.

[John K Jordan]

My BIL lived in town but had a huge garden. The utility installed a separate meter for his outdoor water use that eliminated the sewer charge.

Around here we don't have that problem - I know of no sewer system infrastructure outside of towns and cities. Every house, farm, mobile home, business has a septic system.

JKJ

[Kev Williams]

Holy moly Ken, How many employees do you have in that shop?
Actual employees, none. Wife and I are partners, she paints whatever engraving needs paint fill, does about 15% of the invoicing. My BIL comes in at 9, leaves at 3, he engraves flat work, plastic buttons, and whatever high qty jobs I set up for him to run. And he's my gopher. He has his own biz license so not an employee. My daughter comes in on Thursdays, she runs high qty jobs and such that I set up, gopher work... All other aspects of this business is my job...

[Roger Feeley]

I feel kind of lucky.
2600 sq feet. One zone.
all electric (induction cooktop is awesome)
Monthly bill usually around $100. Highest was $238. Low was $13.

just went on Medicare. Our biggest expense used to be health ins. My wife goes on Medicare in May. Whoopeeee!

[Lee DeRaud]

I just looked at last year's totals: electric, water, sewer, trash collection, and gas totals out to almost exactly $200/month.
The gas was about 15% of the total, the others are billed together so I didn't bother breaking them out.

Two people in a 1750sqft house, not particularly well-insulated. (Well, I am, but the house isn't. :) )

[Brian Elfert]

One thing I have noticed through the years is that the people that try to keep their houses "cool" in the winter and "warm" in the summer to save money, are also ones that seem to be sick the most at work with every bug that goes around, especially in winter. It has been years since I've had a cold or flu bug. The ones trying to keep their houses at 62-64 through the winter are always sick at work. Just an observation.

I keep my house at 71F and I am just getting over influenza. (Yes, had flu shot.) The number one reason that disease doctors give for more illness in cold weather is simply people being indoors all the time with groups of people.

[Brian Elfert]

There was recently some media coverage locally about how the USDA wants to cut the allowance for utilities used to calculate SNAP benefits (food stamps). Currently, $490 per month for utilities is deducted from an applicant's monthly income to determine eligibility for SNAP benefits.

These people are living in the wrong types of housing if they are spending an average of $490 per month on utility bills. This probably means $500 or more per month for just gas during the winter months. There is no chance you would ever catch me buying a house with almost $6,000 a year in utility costs. I was spending right about $1,450 per year for gas and electricity before I got my solar installed. I keep my house temps at 71F during heating season and 74F/75F during cooling season.

[Jim Becker]

Brian, a lot of the housing that less advantaged folks live in is older, has less efficient systems, poor windows and doors and lacks modern insulation or air infiltration protection. Utilities also tend to be higher in urban areas where many disadvantaged folks live. My house is mostly modern, has decent insulation, almost all new windows (except in the 250 year old portion), on-site water and sewer and our utility costs exceed $6K a year based on averages for electric and gas. And as I noted we shoot for 68ºF during the heating season and 74ºF in the cooling season. Cost of housing is also difficult in many areas...we're currently exploring things to help our older daughter hopefully live independently real soon now. Rents for a studio sized apartment are no lower than $950 in our area and that's BEFORE utilities. She already lost her wopping $135 a month SNAP because of making $10 more than the limit with her part time job. (she is disabled and limited in what she can do) My point is that it's not easy out there and utility costs are more than many folks realize in many areas, regardless of socio-economic status.

[Tom M King]

I had a funny occurrence with our electric bill today, and remembered this thread, so came to tell the funny story. Evidently, my Wife and I have both paid the electric bill for a couple of months. She goes by what comes in the mail, and I probably had already paid them online. I went to the online account, to see if they had posted a bill yet, and found that we have an $824 credit, so we had overlapped payments some kind of way for a couple of months. I cancelled paper billing.

[Lee DeRaud]

These people are living in the wrong types of housing if they are spending an average of $490 per month on utility bills.You say that like you think they have a choice.

Hint: people in rental housing don't get to decide how much insulation or what appliances are installed.

[Ron Hampe]

We're in southwestern PA and built an 1875 sq. ft. 1 1/2 story home with a full basement in 1985. We have a beautiful view but sit on top of a very windy hill. Also have a large detached garage, 900 sq. ft. of which is a fully insulated woodshop. Went with all LED lighting a couple of years and currently paying $.053 KWH. Our average monthly bill is $95, but have a rate hike to $.073 that goes into effect next month. We have a well and septic, whole house a/c and heat with oil hot water (500 gallons a year). Refuse removal is $200 a year.

[Frank Pratt]

There was recently some media coverage locally about how the USDA wants to cut the allowance for utilities used to calculate SNAP benefits (food stamps). Currently, $490 per month for utilities is deducted from an applicant's monthly income to determine eligibility for SNAP benefits.

These people are living in the wrong types of housing if they are spending an average of $490 per month on utility bills. This probably means $500 or more per month for just gas during the winter months. There is no chance you would ever catch me buying a house with almost $6,000 a year in utility costs. I was spending right about $1,450 per year for gas and electricity before I got my solar installed. I keep my house temps at 71F during heating season and 74F/75F during cooling season.

It is amazing how low your utility bills can be if you can afford to make it that way. Unfortunately, many do not have the means to do that.