Cost of Housing/Living in El Paso (Austin: extended stay, apartment)

[Trainwreck20]

Random question -

I may be taking a job in El Paso that will end up with me on-site about 1/2 the time and back at home (Austin) the other half of the time. Still working out all the details, but if I go one of the extended stay places, it is probably 800-1000/month for 10-12 nights a month there. Not a whole lot of other expenses other than food.

I am toying with the idea of buying a small house in the area. It looks like there are quite a few houses in the $150k to $200k range that are quite nice and spread all over the city - so while I don't really know specific areas of El Paso yet, I am assuming that some are in okay areas.

Anyway, trying to do a ball-park cost comparison and see how much extra the house would run me. Most of it is pretty easy - mortgage, taxes, insurance, etc - but I am unfamiliar with the utilities out there. It looks like they run around $200/month for water/waste/wastewater/elec, assuming I stay at or under the 5 CCF water and somewhere at or around 600 kWh/month. The 'flat' fees appear to be a pretty high $100/month and the electric is the unknown.

So, questions - I have never owned a home with a swamp cooler and assume that is the standard out there. It looks like they don't use much water (a few hundred gallons/month?), but is that accurate? And are they (or can they be) monitored remotely? I would think I would minimize their use while not there but would like some way to monitor that nothing is wrong.

And if I am not having to running an AC - and not even there half the time using anything - I am assuming that it is not difficult to stay <600 kWh in a modest (~1500 sf house)?

The job would likely be 4 or 5 years minimum and it looks like the housing market is not that big of a risk. Any random insight as to why this might be an awful idea?

Thanks!

[Caltep]

After many years of being here (transplant) I finally changed from swamp to central very recently. A couple of reasons:


1) Since we moved here almost 20 years ago, it seems swamp coolers have been less efficient and I understand that goes with El Paso being more humid over that time. We even had our (2) coolers replaced and we couldn't consistently keep the house at a comfortable level. And they wore out really fast despite the amount of time I spent servicing them (new ones lasted approx. 5 years).



2) Although you can maintain swamp coolers yourself, my experience is I spent an inordinate amount of time on the roof fixing every little thing that went wrong....leaking feed lines, hard water buildup on everything (and components rusting quickly), replacing pumps once or twice a year, replacing pads, belts, motors, shot bearings, diagnosing the system every time water came pouring off the roof, beginning and end of season start up and close down. Too much time up there. And I have a two story house. And it's freaking hot on the roof....had to start at 6.30 am sometimes or right before sunset.



Yes, many homes do still maintain swamp coolers but all new builds I believe now come with AC. I guess it depends on how much time (and willingness) you have to spend working on these things. You can tell some folks cannot easily service their units....hard water stains on their shingles! And calling AC techs all the time adds up...$100 per visit. For part time residency, I don't think swamp is worth it. Folks may disagree with me...just relating my opinion.


Hope this was useful to you.

[North Beach Person]

Just stay away from Rosa's Cantina or may run into the barmaid named Wicked Feleena.

[Trainwreck20]

Originally Posted by Caltep

After many years of being here (transplant) I finally changed from swamp to central very recently. A couple of reasons:


1) Since we moved here almost 20 years ago, it seems swamp coolers have been less efficient and I understand that goes with El Paso being more humid over that time. We even had our (2) coolers replaced and we couldn't consistently keep the house at a comfortable level. And they wore out really fast despite the amount of time I spent servicing them (new ones lasted approx. 5 years).



2) Although you can maintain swamp coolers yourself, my experience is I spent an inordinate amount of time on the roof fixing every little thing that went wrong....leaking feed lines, hard water buildup on everything (and components rusting quickly), replacing pumps once or twice a year, replacing pads, belts, motors, shot bearings, diagnosing the system every time water came pouring off the roof, beginning and end of season start up and close down. Too much time up there. And I have a two story house. And it's freaking hot on the roof....had to start at 6.30 am sometimes or right before sunset.



Yes, many homes do still maintain swamp coolers but all new builds I believe now come with AC. I guess it depends on how much time (and willingness) you have to spend working on these things. You can tell some folks cannot easily service their units....hard water stains on their shingles! And calling AC techs all the time adds up...$100 per visit. For part time residency, I don't think swamp is worth it. Folks may disagree with me...just relating my opinion.


Hope this was useful to you.

Thanks!

I wondered about the (seemingly) ubiquitous stained shingles.

I just took the job and the company will be paying for an apartment for me, but I may look at buying a place and seeing if I could swap their apartment cost for extra pay at some point in the future. The apts are all AC, fwiw.