[modhatter]

My neighbor across the street added a swamp cooler on the back side of his house. It is out of sight of neighbors and HOA, so shouldn't be any problem. It just cools the downstairs as his is a two story home. He uses it most of the time, but most likely on the days we are up to above 112 degrees or more he probably turns on his AC.

I have considered doing this next year, but don't have the same room access he does, but it is something I want to look into next year. My electric this month for a 1700 sq. ft house is looking like it is going to be in the $375 + range, and I keep it at 80. Hate to think what July and August will be.

I also like to be as environmentally conscious as I can. So it seems like looking into it is a good idea, and you might want to consider it yourself when you get in and get settled. I see all kinds or portable units in the stores. I know Scoop has a whole house unit installed. That's a bigger investment, and if that is visible to the outside, you probably couldn't install one if you have a HOA. People who work usually turn their thermostats up (or have a programmable thermostat) when they are away at work. When you are retired or work from home, you can't do this. I don't have any idea how much you can save on your bill by turning it up while you are at work, as I have always worked from home. Someone else might chime in on that.

[tiger08]

Originally Posted by modhatter

My neighbor across the street added a swamp cooler on the back side of his house. It is out of sight of neighbors and HOA, so shouldn't be any problem. It just cools the downstairs as his is a two story home. He uses it most of the time, but most likely on the days we are up to above 112 degrees or more he probably turns on his AC.

I have considered doing this next year, but don't have the same room access he does, but it is something I want to look into next year. My electric this month for a 1700 sq. ft house is looking like it is going to be in the $375 + range, and I keep it at 80. Hate to think what July and August will be.

I also like to be as environmentally conscious as I can. So it seems like looking into it is a good idea, and you might want to consider it yourself when you get in and get settled. I see all kinds or portable units in the stores. I know Scoop has a whole house unit installed. That's a bigger investment, and if that is visible to the outside, you probably couldn't install one if you have a HOA. People who work usually turn their thermostats up (or have a programmable thermostat) when they are away at work. When you are retired or work from home, you can't do this. I don't have any idea how much you can save on your bill by turning it up while you are at work, as I have always worked from home. Someone else might chime in on that.

While I agree with the swamp cooler addition for savings, it sounds like you may have issues with either your a/c, or your home insulation. At just over 1800 square feet, we are running 70-71 on the a/c and came in at $272. We also have pool pumps and lots of other stuff running around the house.

In an HOA, about the best thing you could do is to install a unit in a wall below the fence line. Blowing the air directly into the house, usually works better than having it ducted in.
As far as portables go, they are many times innefective.
At 1700 square feet, the Bonaire cooler I mentioned earlier would be a great choice and it only hangs out the side of the house about 10 inches.
On high speed, the Bonaire is somewhere around 4 amps. That would probably cost you somewhere in the 15 to 20 dollar range per month to run it 24 hours a day.

[TomKBL]

Originally Posted by modhatter

My neighbor across the street added a swamp cooler on the back side of his house. It is out of sight of neighbors and HOA, so shouldn't be any problem. It just cools the downstairs as his is a two story home. He uses it most of the time, but most likely on the days we are up to above 112 degrees or more he probably turns on his AC.

I have considered doing this next year, but don't have the same room access he does, but it is something I want to look into next year. My electric this month for a 1700 sq. ft house is looking like it is going to be in the $375 + range, and I keep it at 80. Hate to think what July and August will be.

I also like to be as environmentally conscious as I can. So it seems like looking into it is a good idea, and you might want to consider it yourself when you get in and get settled. I see all kinds or portable units in the stores. I know Scoop has a whole house unit installed. That's a bigger investment, and if that is visible to the outside, you probably couldn't install one if you have a HOA. People who work usually turn their thermostats up (or have a programmable thermostat) when they are away at work. When you are retired or work from home, you can't do this. I don't have any idea how much you can save on your bill by turning it up while you are at work, as I have always worked from home. Someone else might chime in on that.

For a 2400 sf + house, my electric bill for June was $100.58. The electric bill for this month (July) is estimated to be around $150 by NV Energy. These are about the same for the last three years. We have two AC units cooling for the first floor and sec floor separately. I work from home most of the time and I set the thermostat at 82 for downstairs and 85 for upstairs during daytime and reverse the setting during night (our master bed is upstairs). I am considering having a portable AC installed in my master room, so that I can set both central AC thermostats at 85 during nights, hoping to save $30-50/month during summer. If we decide to do that, we all (two adults and three dogs) have to stay in the same master room.

[TomKBL]

"My electric this month for a 1700 sq. ft house is looking like it is going to be in the $375 + range, and I keep it at 80. Hate to think what July and August will be."

At 80, $375 appears way to high to me. I would have the AC and the house checked asap.

[Raiderman]

We just got our first bill for our 2100sq ft house. We keep it at 78 from 6a-11p, and 76 from 11p-6a. Our bill was $300 on the nose. We have no special plan with NVEnergy, just whatever is standard. They did say on their site to do laundry off-peak, which we didn't. I also left my 32" computer monitors on 24 hours/day as well as 4 laptops running 24 hours/day. Add all of the ceiling fans running continuously, and I think we see areas where we can improve and conserve some dough

[tiger08]

Originally Posted by Raiderman

We just got our first bill for our 2100sq ft house. We keep it at 78 from 6a-11p, and 76 from 11p-6a. Our bill was $300 on the nose. We have no special plan with NVEnergy, just whatever is standard. They did say on their site to do laundry off-peak, which we didn't. I also left my 32" computer monitors on 24 hours/day as well as 4 laptops running 24 hours/day. Add all of the ceiling fans running continuously, and I think we see areas where we can improve and conserve some dough

If your not running a pool pump or any other large items, then 300 is too high for your home. ceiling fans pull very little power and laptops wont be much more. Do you run any extra fridges or freezers? Solar screens? Has the a/c been serviced lately?
In all reality, with proper insulation, solar screens and an efficient properly sized a/c, your bill should be under 200 dollars.

[MadManofBethesda]

Originally Posted by Raiderman

Add all of the ceiling fans running continuously, and I think we see areas where we can improve and conserve some dough

Why would you have all of your ceiling fans running continuously? Having a ceiling fan running without someone in the room to benefit from the circulation serves absolutely no purpose whatsoever (other than to increase your electric bill).

[Raiderman]

Originally Posted by tiger08

If your not running a pool pump or any other large items, then 300 is too high for your home. ceiling fans pull very little power and laptops wont be much more. Do you run any extra fridges or freezers? Solar screens? Has the a/c been serviced lately?
In all reality, with proper insulation, solar screens and an efficient properly sized a/c, your bill should be under 200 dollars.

No solar screens.. we're renting and haven't wanted to mess with the existing window coverings, but we're going to look in to it. A/C was just serviced and we (thankfully) have a community pool behind our house instead of our own.

[Raiderman]

Originally Posted by MadManofBethesda

Why would you have all of your ceiling fans running continuously? Having a ceiling fan running without someone in the room to benefit from the circulation serves absolutely no purpose whatsoever (other than to increase your electric bill).

Habit, I s'pose. I work from home and go to the various rooms throughout the day. My wife and stepdaughter are both home during the day in various parts of the house so the rooms are occupied more than not. But we're going to be more vigilant about turning them off should we leave the room.

[Everdeen]

Originally Posted by tiger08

Actually what you have on that cooler is a factory bleed off line to help eleminate scale buildup on the pads. Your husband can retrofit a timed dump pump system to the cooler and then it will only dump 3 to 4 gallons every 8 hours of cooler run time.

We discussed this and would have done it. We just figured it was water would have used in our pool anyway. The continuous flow has not eliminate scale build up, btw. I suppose it is less than it would be.