Tell us about your McMansion AC/electric bills (Houston: appointed, appliances)

[snackdog]

Those of you with big houses (5,000 sq ft and up), tell us about what you are paying for electricity each year. I'm guessing you average maybe $300/month?

[gwarnecke]

Better to talk about electricity usage rather than bills, since price/kWH can vary quite a bit.

Our previous home, 4500 sq ft 1990 built had electric usage that ranged from ~600 kWH in the winter to around 2200 kWH in the summer. I think our highest monthly bill was right around $200. The house had single-pane windows, so-so insulation, and 14 SEER HVAC, but it also had excellent southern and western shade from mature pine and oak trees. All gas appliances except electric oven and dryer. No pool.

Our current home is 3900 sq ft 1986 built. It has much better insulation, double-pane windows, and 21 SEER HVAC, plus everything in the house is gas, even the oven and dryer. Pretty good shade from mature trees, but not quite as much as the old house. I was disappointed to find that it uses a TON more energy than the old place! Monthly usage has ranged from 1800 to 3600 kWH (the upper end of this may have been exacerbated by an HVAC ducting issue that has since been resolved). Pools are expensive to run! Will likely install a variable speed pool pump next year, which will hopefully help.

[Jtxg]

My parents have a 4400 ft house that was built in 2017. In the summer time, I think their house is cold on the inside. With a pool their highest bill in the summer was $170.

On the other hand, I have a 30-year old house that's about 2500 ft with a pool. In July and August my bill is usually around $350, and I'm not home during the day time M-F.

So if it is a newer-built home, chances are the bill will be significantly less than an older home.

[elnina]

Originally Posted by snackdog

Those of you with big houses (5,000 sq ft and up), tell us about what you are paying for electricity each year. I'm guessing you average maybe $300/month?

People generally don't save on electricity. They don't usually turn off the lights when they leave room. Many people run tv and computers 24/7

There could be some savings made by equipping the whole house with energy saving light bulbs and having energy efficient appliances. Proper insulation is also very important.
A/C is usually running 24/7 on hot days and that could mean 3/4 of a year.
Water heaters consume a lot of energy too.
So, not every 5,000sqft house will show the same energy consumption, especially if they also have swimming pool.

Look how Houston is illuminated at night. We all pay for that too...

There are energy usage/cost calculators online.
Here you can compare plans:
http://www.powertochoose.org/#

[oceangaia]

Originally Posted by elnina

People generally don't save on electricity. They don't usually turn off the lights when they leave room. Many people run tv and computers 24/7

It's good to save where you can but those things are such a small factor in your energy consumption that it's not worth going out of your way. If you've done all you can about the major items and want to do a little more, fine. But I've seen people who go to great efforts to save pennies in one area while throwing away dollars in other areas.

[tewest86]

Originally Posted by oceangaia

It's good to save where you can but those things are such a small factor in your energy consumption that it's not worth going out of your way. If you've done all you can about the major items and want to do a little more, fine. But I've seen people who go to great efforts to save pennies in one area while throwing away dollars in other areas.

True! Turning off tv's and lights might save you $5 at the most for that month and that's being generous. Read the energy stickers on electronic devices you buy. They show the average yearly cost to run using an average kw rate. My new TV showed about $11 for the entire year. The energy hogs are the A/C compressor, Fridge (still low), electric furnace, Electric dryer, and electric oven.

Now if you unplug every single item in your house then you may see savings but who does that daily? It's hard to only plug up you Fridge or tv when you need it. That's not practical. Join the Tx sight Smart meter Texas where you can see your kw usage daily. I used to pull mines monthly and graph it. You can clearly see when my A/c's kicked on. The KW/hrs shot up.

[gwarnecke]

That's a great point - it's worth spending a bit of time to investigate your electricity usage, using a Kill-A-Watt and/or the Smart Meter Texas website. I made a couple of surprising observations:

-The Bunn ”always on” coffee maker and garage fridge that I thought were such energy hogs actually use only about $50 or $60 total per year.
-OTOH, resistive electric water heaters are huge energy hogs! We have one that serves only our guest wing, after figuring how much it costs to leave on all the time, I've switched it off whenever we aren't hosting guests (the other water heaters in our house are gas).
-As was mentioned earlier, electricity usage for LED lights is negligible. The gains associated with improving your HVAC efficiency or perhaps getting rid of a very old energy-hog fridge would dwarf those associated with any discipline in turning off lights that you're not using.
-Pool pumps use a ton of energy!

Overall, I think the degree to which energy usage is correlated to home size, and even quality of insulation, are overstated. The presence/absence of lots of resistive heating appliances, presence of a pool, and degree of shade on your property can be more impactful than people realize.

[snackdog]

I'm not really looking for energy saving tips, but thanks anyhow.

Sounds like big house are cheap to run in Houston. Most I heard was $350/mo with a pool. That's pretty cheap.

[texas7]

We had a home built in 2002. Two story, one ac unit, 2370 sq ft. Our summer utility bills ran about 350-380 in the summer and that was keeping thermostat at 78 day and 75 night. We moved to a newer home, one story, more energy efficient and same footage and highest bills are 140 in the summer. Thermostat at 73 day and 69 night.

[tewest86]

Originally Posted by snackdog

I'm not really looking for energy saving tips, but thanks anyhow.

Sounds like big house are cheap to run in Houston. Most I heard was $350/mo with a pool. That's pretty cheap.

Do you currently live in Texas? It depends on the house. It also depends on what Electric company you sign up with. I have co-workers with 3,000 sf/ft house with a pool paying $600-700 during the summer. These single pane windows they threw every house built before the 2000’s don’t help. I’ve people with bills close to $1000 in the hotter months and only able to keep the house at 78 during the hottest part of the day.