How much are your utility bills? (fit in, apartment complex, appliances)

[bhouston77386]

How much is your electric bill?

Water bill?

Gas bill?

I know people have different situations such as home vs apartment, home size ec, so please list your situation.

[alexis2005]

We live on Green Mountain and our water bill is only $24 a month! Our electricity and gas combined averages $105 a month. We have a 3400 sq. ft. house with a 12000 sq. ft. lot (full sprinkler system, front and back) In Dallas our gas was $150, electric $200 and water $55 a month! (2400 sq. ft. house and a 5000 sq. ft. lot.

[DenverLawGal]

We live in a tri-level townhome w/basement. It's a total of 1900 sq. ft. Our insulation is not so good but... in the summer our gas/electric is about $60-70. In the winter it shoots up (because of the heat) to about $100-$120. A lot depends on what the utility commission decides to charge, and how cold it is. We keep our thermometer at 65 degrees all winter. We have a gas fireplace and tend to rely on that more since it uses less energy. We have a water (swamp) cooler and that's really nice in the summer. It keeps our energy bills low. So I suppose a lot would depend on the age of your home, the size, and how good your insulation/windows are. They told us this year the prices were going up for energy, but we've yet to experience it. Of course, we've only had a couple of snows that didn't stay; it's been unusually warm, so I'm thinking come Jan. the cost is going to shoot up. Last Jan. I was shocked to get a $200 bill!!

[zionvier]

WTME: I got a notice in the mail the other day from Xcel talking about the increase in rates. For me the increase will only be about $5, but the notice did say that due to voting and other things you're unlikely to see the increase until almost June.

As for my consumption: I live alone, 950 sq ft house, gas water heater and heating, electric dryer, stove and everything else... I do NOT have A/C. My biggest energy consumption is with 4 computer that are always on and a fridge that is 10 years old and not energy-star compliant. I use all CFL light bulbs by the way... I've been at a steady 530 kwh/month with electricity, gas has been around 12 therms. The price on that with taxes,fees, etc sits around $56 for electricity and $20 for gas. Water tends to run me around $20/month, even during the summer with the grass. Luckily I don't have a large yard and I try to conserve energy/water/gas as much as possible with what I have.... since I live alone and don't need a huge fridge, I just filled the empty space of my fridge with gallons of water to take up space, retain the temperature and help the fridge use less energy. I actually have a pretty long post on the math of trying to decrease my consumption to save money over in the green-living forum... I'll know if a few months how it all works out ;-) http://www.city-data.com/forum/green...matically.html

[DenverLawGal]

Zion: I'm sure some things have changed since I last was reading about this. It was a few months ago they announced that they were shutting people off because of non-payment and they also said to expect a 25% increase this winter. It was right about when the market crashed. If the change doesn't come until June then we'll do just fine.

Cool that you are using low energy bulbs. We try, but sometimes they won't fit in our fixtures.

I forgot to mention that we don't pay for water, it comes out of our HOA.

[steveindenver]

One interesting thing about the two bills below. One is for a house that is nearly 3 times the size of the other, but the bills (same month) are about the same. The only thing that changed was the property with additional insulation and care taken to reduce energy consumption (CFL, energy star, etc).

Another fun bit is the commodity adjustment charges which now often actually cost MORE than the actual energy used. I'm not sure when they started breaking these out, but I sometimes wish they did not.

Nov 2007 Utility Bill.

~3800 square feet finished. Gas heat and gas tankless Hot Water, All CFL, Thermostat set to 70 during the day 68 at night. Very good HERS rating, all energy star.



Nov 2006 Utility Bill (different property)
1380 square feet. Remodel from 1880 building in 1999, gutted. Energy Star appliances, gas heat and water tank for water.

[DenverLawGal]

yeah, insulation is a biggie. Our windows def. need to be replaced, and when we had to buy a water heater, we couldn't afford the energy compliance ones, so we ended up getting the cheaper one. I wished we would have spent the extra $$.

[cowboyxjon]

I live on the 2nd floor of a mid-1980s apartment complex. The windows are terrible so we use blackout drapes, but otherwise, our electric and gas bill runs about $70 on average. Obviously it peaks in the winter and summer when it's hot and cold, and most of this is due to the air conditioning and heating.

[DenverLawGal]

Sheesh cowboy! And how big is your apt.?

[cowboyxjon]

Originally Posted by wanttomoveeast

Sheesh cowboy! And how big is your apt.?

Hey, sorry i forgot that bit of info. It's 1100 square feet, but has a lot of low quality cheap "apartment complex-grade" 1980s windows. It's also an end unit so it has more windows than most of the other units. We turn the heat down to around 64 on COLD days or turn it completely off during the day when we're not home (if it's warm enough to do so) and usually have it set for around 68 in the evening when we're home.