Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Do you have an older fridge or free-standing freezer? You say the stove and dryer aren't used much, so I doubt that's it.
When we lived in California, our electric bill was outrageous. I would have gladly paid $175 dollars a month. Our roommates were terrible about leaving lights on, computers on, TVs on, etc., and our bill was usually around $300. The first summer we lived there, we made the mistake of running the air quite a bit, and THAT bill was $850.
Once the roommates moved out, the bill went way down. California has a tiered billing structure where if your usage falls into bucket A, you're charged so much per kW. Bucket B gets rate B, and so on. The higher your usage, the higher your rate. This is Southern California Edison's way to discourage high electric bills. We lived in a large, drafty house that faced the afternoon sun, so that didn't help.
If your electric company also bills on a tiered structure, take a look at where you fall. You might be missing a cheaper bucket by just a little.
You can also buy something called Kill-a-Watt, which determines how many watts each appliance uses.
California... 1950's split-level 2300 sq feet... $78 gas and electric July PG&E
Single pane window, attic insulation... no energy star appliances... most 30 years old or older... Amana deep freeze 41 years old Only Gas Furnace is high efficiency
i live in 1700 feet in FL and my electric bills are never over $100 even in the middle of the summer!
Agreed! I've got 1200 more feet than you, and my bill averages to $140 a month year round. And I've got not only the fridge, but two wine coolers (one's a 600+ bottle size!) running as well.
This last time, the bill went to $250. Been paying about $90. Only real thing I can see is a problem with the refrigerator. Seems like the compressor is kicking on all the time!
You might turn all of your breakers off and see if anything else in the area goes off at the same time. Just in case, something else is wired into your meter.
An expensive habit that you can easily break is to turn on water in a mixer faucet set in the center when you just want cold water. You'll get cold for a brief moment and not realize that you are taking water out of the water heater and replacing it with cold water. The water heater will then come on.
It's really meaningless to compare your bill to other people' bills. Even in the exact same house it is meaningless. I lived in one of mine and the electric ran about $80 in the winter and $125 in the summer. The next tenant complained bitterly that her power bills were $250-$300 a month. The tenant after her had $60 a month electric bills. Everyone was using the exact same appliances because they came with the house. The lady with the $300 bills was single. The tenants with the $60 bills were a family of four.
The lady with the $300 bills was insisting that she wasn't doing anything to use electricity so the house was faulty. Which didn't withstand the test of time becasue the very next tenants had really low bills.
If you are paying for a lot of power, OP, you are using a lot of power. Have the electric company check for shorts and check to see that the meter is working correctly. But I suspect that your bill is that high because you are using that much power.
You might turn all of your breakers off and see if anything else in the area goes off at the same time. Just in case, something else is wired into your meter.
An expensive habit that you can easily break is to turn on water in a mixer faucet set in the center when you just want cold water. You'll get cold for a brief moment and not realize that you are taking water out of the water heater and replacing it with cold water. The water heater will then come on.
It's really meaningless to compare your bill to other people' bills. Even in the exact same house it is meaningless. I lived in one of mine and the electric ran about $80 in the winter and $125 in the summer. The next tenant complained bitterly that her power bills were $250-$300 a month. The tenant after her had $60 a month electric bills. Everyone was using the exact same appliances because they came with the house. The lady with the $300 bills was single. The tenants with the $60 bills were a family of four.
The lady with the $300 bills was insisting that she wasn't doing anything to use electricity so the house was faulty. Which didn't withstand the test of time becasue the very next tenants had really low bills.
If you are paying for a lot of power, OP, you are using a lot of power. Have the electric company check for shorts and check to see that the meter is working correctly. But I suspect that your bill is that high because you are using that much power.
Overuse of power is still a valid topic, but this particular thread is 7 years old, so I'm guessing they've figured it out by now
The State I reside has a program called M-Power, you pay as you go. I love it because you get a meter that records daily, hourly, minute, and monthly usages for you. You can see how much power you're using when you use the oven, turn on lights, or use appliances. The meter comes with a fee of $178.00 and $117.00 of that is refundable when the meter is returned. $30 is automatically added to your meter to get you started with power, the remaining amount is nonrefundable. You can pay that charge up front or have the amount deducted slowly out of every purchase of power you make by 25% until debt is recovered. In other words if you purchase $100 worth of power 25% is deducted first and $75.00 credit is placed on your meter for your usage.
You can check your breakers at home with this service. Turn off all breakers and one by one turn them on. The meter will flash with a steady light and number if the breaker is fine or it will flash randomly with numbers if there's a problem which means you may need to change that breaker. Before I cook or use the AC I write down the time and amount of my credit remaining and when I finish I repeat the steps. The difference tells me how much power was used by that appliance in that 1-2 hours time. I just recently purchased surge power plugs and turn them off when I'm not using that area of my space and I'ts made a huge difference so far. A victory of $.53 was charged to my meter for over 6 hours at night from my usual $1.90. My daily rate of charges has gone from $3.76 to a little over $4 per day to $2.72 per day in 670 sqft. Even though I'm pleased with my reduction I have notice some faulty charges in the range of $1.12 per day that I'm researching. So yes power companies are ripping us off and collectively we will find out how. Meanwhile fight back and Good luck!
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.