Reply With Quote
My electricity bill for July was less than fifty dollars.
$300 Electricity bill = 3 months unpaid bills plus fees.... busted.
My electricity bill for July was less than fifty dollars.
I wish my costs were that low. I could have used the extra $500 from the last two month's bills.
Our apt. is larger, we keep the AC running all day, off at night, and our bill is $100 during the summer $50 during the "colder" months.
Raise woman.
Says the guy with one of the longest sigs on the board. GMAFB.
Wow, I'm paying 10.5 cents in Maryland, but we're about to undergo a 40% rate increase (yes, that's right).
How can there be that much variance in price in one state?
Damn, I am never leaving my all-utilities-paid apartment, ever.
Of course, with the AC going out every other day now sometimes I would like to move anyways.
San Antonio and Austin are served by municipal utilities. They seek to earn a decent return but have no greedy shareholders or executives who get paid depending on the bottom line. SA gets 20% of its annual budget from CPS net profits, Austin gets something similar, so they're able to make a healthy profit even at those low rates. Also worth noting that SA and Austin both have a piece of the South Texas Nuclear Project; Austin wanted to ditch their part of it back in the 80's but I bet they are happy to have it now. SA also generates power from coal, natural gas, and I think fuel oil, not sure about Austin.
Dallas and Houston, however, are two parts of the state that have (ahem) semi-regulated "compe ive" rates. How it works is that the former monopoly provider, TXU in Dallas and Reliant in Houston, has to publish what's called a "price to beat." Other providers can try to give you service at lower rates. Only problem is that the "price to beat" people have been allowed to basically jack up their rates once a year b/c they are based on a formula based on the most expensive component, natural gas, and the rates never come down. Last year TXU, Reliant, etc. got a rate increase when natural gas was like $17/MCF. This summer natural gas was $5/MCF but they kept charging the same rate.
Oh, and of course, every time the "price to beat" people raise their rates, everyone else does too, even the people like Green Mountain Energy who produce all their Texas energy from wind power (which is subsidized by the Feds, even) and have fixed costs.
Go to www.powertochoose.org, enter different zip codes (Dallas, Houston, Abilene, Corpus Christi are the major players) and see just how screwed up things are. Reliant charges a couple cents less per kWh in Dallas than they do in Houston. Green Mountain charges the most in Abilene even though that's the closest location to their wind farm. It's totally bogus and always changing.
Energy rates are screwed up in Texas, just like homeowners' insurance rates are screwed up, automobile rates are screwed up, etc ...
For you apartment dwellers, get a room ... one on the first floor, facing East.
I just moved into such an apartment and my bill dropped about $60 for the past month. Physical location makes a huge difference.
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)
Posting Permissions
