Money Saving Talk

Everyone is talking about solar panels and their benefits. Of course, most consumers want to know how much they can actually save on utility bills. It’s not cheap to have solar panels installed on your roof. It could run anywhere from $10K to $20K. So it’s a big investment. How long will it take you to recoup the cost of installing. Well, it’ll probably take you a decade. So here comes the problem, if you sell the house before then, you don’t recoup the cost. But of course it’ll add value to your house and equity.

However, if the housing market keeps stagnant, you might have a hard time getting the money back. That’s the financial part. Environmentally, it’ll help greatly if many household make the investment.

The gas price is still going up. It looks like we’re not going to get $2 per gallon gas any time soon. Maybe never again. So should we all rush to get electric cars. probably not, giving the cost of purchasing them. For most of us, we just have to make the best of of what we got. To save on gas. Many experts will teach you tips on how to save a little here and a little there. One that I heard recently is to fill the car up every time you get gas. The reason for that is so you don’t have to drive to the gas stations all the time thus saving gas on that.

Well, that may be true. Some say that you should combine all errands together and take good care of your car. The problem is that what do you do if you have to commute to work for 45 minutes one way and let the car idle for a whole 10 minutes sitting in the traffic? So I’ve figured out that little here and there do help. But the most important thing to do is to drive less. Carpool or take public transportation.

This is a much debated topic. Is it more economical using the air conditioning or letting the window down? It all depends. If you are driving in local traffic or get stuck in a traffic, it is definitely cheaper to open the windows. But if you are on a high way and going at over 65, it is better on gas to close the window and run the air conditioning. Because doing so decreases air resistance.

But the problem is, if you got stuck in traffic and the temperature is 95, will you still leave the air conditioning off? So the best way to save gas is to carpool, and combine errands together so to reduce the chance of getting stuck in a traffic.

Although there’s so much you can do to winterize your apartment to save on utility bills, there are simple energy conservation measures you can use to increase the comfort of your apartment.You can caulk and weatherstrip the window and exterior doors; select and use window treatments.

Since heating and cooling use about 56% of the energy in average American home, saving on heating and cooling will significantly reduce your bills. Although your landlord or management company is ultimately responsible for your building’s energy efficiency, you can use supporting energy source such as space heaters to make your apartment more comfortable.

Source: EERE