If you live paycheck to paycheck like most American's, you're all too familiar with the second biggest bill in the house, the power bill. It comes monthly and it just sucks. The cost of heating and air conditioning your home can make you crazy enough to go without these modern comforts of life in fear of having more bills than you have money. This certainly isn't the way anyone should have to wake up in the morning, knowing that you're stuck although you want to lower my electricity bill.
Some time ago, it was thought that creating a means by which a homeowner could independently and cleanly provide electricity for their home would not only help the homeowner to lower my power bill, but would also help to preserve the environment. There were however, many obstacles in the way and only two ways to remedy the situation at the time. One way was to turn the air conditioning higher in summer, turning on the fans while sweating a little, and keep the heat off in the winter. You'd just put some socks on and snuggle up with a loved one in. Joy.
The second way was to go out and spend large sums of money upfront to never get a return on your investment, at least not in your lifetime. So, unless you were rich and just wanted to do your part to save the planet and go green, this wasn't an option for many.
Fast forward to today whereby a homeowner can seemingly have their proverbial cake and eat it too. Specifically, they can now save money on their power bill and get the power company to pay for it. If you haven't thought about it lately, remind yourself that their is no other power company you can switch to, as your power company has a monopoly and that's that; until now that is.
Let's take a closer look.
After you've completed your in-home energy evaluation, you may be able to save as much as 30%, So for purposes of example let's say that a homeowner has an average electric bill of $300 per month. In the summer the bill is higher and in the winter the bill is lower - we're going with average.
And, for purposes of easy math, if you were able to save $100 of the $300 check you would otherwise give to the power company this would be great right? Well, it gets better. With all this savings, you can now put yourself in a position to own equity in the electricity that powers your house. Off the topic, but worth mentioning, there are many new positions available for green energy consultants.
This means that you can finally upgrade your home with products and modernized solar equipment such as the solar hot water heater, the eco solar shield, thermocool, almost anything while not changing your existing budget. Between the prices coming down on energy saving home upgrades, the 30% federal tax credit and lastly the manufacturer's rebates, this example of a $300 monthly bill being lowered by $100 a month would give the homeowner the opportunity to put that savings into a finance payment. The payoff is generally between 4 and 5 years, but the savings is forever. If you're planning on living in your home for more than 4-5 years, it's a great program. The average power bill savings program saves a homeowner with a $300 average power bill over $30,000, over a 10 year period of time.
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