Utilities cost in Cape Coral (Lee, Pine Island: how much, buying a house, water heater)

[number1regina]

Can anyone tell me what the utilities - water, electric, etc. cost in Cape Coral? My husband and I are buying a house in Cape Coral south of Pine Island road between Veteran's and Chiquita and was told that the water bills are $100 - $200 a month? I tried looking up on Lee County Utlities but I have no idea what their numbers reflect. I just want to be able to afford the water here. I would appreciate any info. Thanks.

[equalrightsforeveryone]

The minimum charges are almost $100.00 per month and you HAVE to pay whether you use water or not.
Trash pickup is the same way not sure what they charge now but you have to pay whether you use it or not, they tack it on to the property tax bill.
Power is a better deal because you are not dealing with the city, you can turn the power off and not have to pay for the months you are not using it.
But the utilities other then power the city has a strangle hold on and they are making you pay so they can live off the fat of the land. Basically you are subsidizing the other utility users, if you don't live here full time.
Personally I think that government, should be barred from suppling utilities to customers.
Way to much waste, so they can pay themselves a nice retirement out of your pocket.

[brian faust]

Originally Posted by number1regina

Can anyone tell me what the utilities - water, electric, etc. cost in Cape Coral? My husband and I are buying a house in Cape Coral south of Pine Island road between Veteran's and Chiquita and was told that the water bills are $100 - $200 a month? I tried looking up on Lee County Utlities but I have no idea what their numbers reflect. I just want to be able to afford the water here. I would appreciate any info. Thanks.

we pay a minimum 47.00 a mo for water when we are not living there

[nhkev]

In the newspress today they said the avg water/ sewer/ irrigation is expected to be $116 month. electric is going to be largely to you. My house is lived in 6 months winter, mostly unoccupied in summer. no pool very little A/C use (parents prefer open windows) A/C set at 85 during summer months. electric bill usually runs $50-$60 a month.

If the house has a pool both these fees can be a lot more. If you are there year round and use A/C during the summer I think you should expect $300 month for electric and close to $200 a month on Utilities.

[stahltkd]

I'm a year round resident - 4/3 house with pool. Our electric runs 200/mo in the summer (our highest bill this year was 207.00) 4 people in the house (2 kids) watching how much electric we consumed. Biggest use was dryer, stove, and pool. Our water bill fluctuates between 80 and 120.

[Hemidancer]

Originally Posted by stahltkd

I'm a year round resident - 4/3 house with pool. Our electric runs 200/mo in the summer (our highest bill this year was 207.00) 4 people in the house (2 kids) watching how much electric we consumed. Biggest use was dryer, stove, and pool. Our water bill fluctuates between 80 and 120.

Holy cow - is LCEC your electrical provider? I live in a 3/2 house with no pool, and I live by myself. Almost never use my stove. Only about 3 dryer loads per week. No pool. My electric bill is about $225-250 a month throughout the summer months with my AC set to 77. My house was built in '63 but has all new windows.

My water is pretty consistently $80/month.

[freddyCF]

Originally Posted by stahltkd

I'm a year round resident - 4/3 house with pool. Our electric runs 200/mo in the summer (our highest bill this year was 207.00) 4 people in the house (2 kids) watching how much electric we consumed. Biggest use was dryer, stove, and pool. Our water bill fluctuates between 80 and 120.

Double wow! Got any tips? I keep T-stat at 78, pool pump running 6 hrs. Bill is well over $300 during the summer months

[stahltkd]

House built in 1978 - with little insulation (probably from 1978) - windows the same.

We run the pool 4.5 hours.
Now that we're back to school - we're gone from 6am to usually 8 or 9pm
Thermostat set at 83ish during the day and 80ish at night
We try to remember to unplug the water heater when not home
There's just 2 of us - except during the summer - so we tend to keep the lights off.
Even with the kids here - open the shades during the day to let enough light in to keep lights off

We tend to only have a couple of loads of laundry per week - we're also trying to line dry vs dryer.
The big drops are when we're not home.
The stove is what jumps the daily use up the most - the last couple of days it's been flat - we ate out. If we eat in and run the w/d we're looking at 12.00 day.

Service from 7/28/2012 − 8/27/2012
Customer Charge 15.00
Energy Charge − first 500 kWh (500 kWh at $0.076) 38.00
Energy Charge − next 500 kWh (500 kWh at $0.0864) 43.20
Energy Charge − over 1000 kWh (714 kWh at
$0.0971)
69.33
Power Cost Adj. (1,714 kWh at $0.01796) 30.78
Summary Of Electric Billing Charges 196.31
Franchise Fee 6.23
Gross Receipts Tax 5.19
Current Charge Subtotal $ 207.73

[Billythepokerkid]

Originally Posted by Hemidancer

Holy cow - is LCEC your electrical provider? I live in a 3/2 house with no pool, and I live by myself. Almost never use my stove. Only about 3 dryer loads per week. No pool. My electric bill is about $225-250 a month throughout the summer months with my AC set to 77. My house was built in '63 but has all new windows.

My water is pretty consistently $80/month.

You need to do some sort of check to see why your bills are so high. I have NEVER hit $225. 78 all summer long, pool running 8 hours a day, house built in the 60's with the original aluminum windows, boat lift, dock lights, 2 tvs basically on all day, stove, oven, dryer. Something is wrong at your place!

[Hemidancer]

Hmmmm...........I have some investigating to do for sure. I do work from home though, so I have 3 computers up and running all day long. I shut the monitors off at night but keep the systems running, and I have a lot of other electronic 'crap' running too - external hard drives, router, Vonage phone adapter, etc. Perhaps I need to just shut it all down for one day and see what kind of difference it makes. I definitely see spikes on laundry days, or on nights when I'm too hot and need to turn the AC down to 75, but other than that, I really can't think of anything I use electricity on. Thanks for the heads up!