Home energy audit can save you money
A typical U.S. family pays about $1,900 a year or $158.33 a month on home utility bills. This figure is a national average from data collected by the Department of Energy, although I suspect you may spend a lot more! Do you know if you could cut only 30% off your home energy consumption, you could actually afford a better home or a better location or perhaps both?
Let’s assume you had a $100,000 mortgage at 5% interest rate required 30 years to repay. Your monthly mortgage payment alone should be $536.82. By simply saving 30% on that $158.33(national average) home utility bills, you could afford to pay additional $47.50 a month toward your mortgage. Therefore, it’s $584.32 monthly loan repayment, which also translated to $108,848 of mortgage with the same 30-year and 5% terms.
If you believe additional $8,848 doesn’t improve your purchasing power much, what if you could save 30% on your $300 utility bills? Well, I think $300 sounds more reasonable than $158.33. Really, how many people pay $158.33 a month on their utility bills these days! Maybe long ago when energy cost was much cheaper.
That’s really great, but how do you achieve it you ask. A home energy audit is often the first step in making your home more efficient and save money on utility bills. An audit can help you assess how much energy your home uses and evaluate what measures you can take to improve efficiency. Homeowners should have an audit done and implement some cost-effective energy saving practices into their home. When it’s time to sell, you’re already a step ahead of the other competing homes in the market. Home buyers are very much into the “green” nowadays. And if you’re a home buyer who didn’t consider this factor in the past, you should seriously consider it now. Buying an environmentally-sound home is a simple way to maximize your spending dollar.
A professional Home Energy Auditor is usually the best option when it comes to getting specific recommendations for improving the efficiency of your home. A professional auditor uses a variety of techniques and equipments to determine the energy efficiency of your home, and then he/she recommends comprehensive improvements that will yield the best results in combination of comfort, air quality, and energy efficiency.
The cost of a home energy audit is starting from $200 to $500 depending on the experience of the auditor, the size of a home, and the sophistication of techniques employed. Your may want to contact your utility companies first to see if they offer free or discounted energy audits to their customers. If not, you can hire a home energy expert to evaluate your home’s energy efficiency. It’s truly worth every penny!