Smaller homes should mean smaller energy bills, but unfortunately, that’s not always the case. What should you do to make sure you find the right plan for your apartment or smaller home?
At a glance
- Average home size: 1000 square feet
- Average energy use: 880 kWh/month of energy
- Our recommendation: tiered rate plans
- Watch out for: minimum use fees
- Plans to check out:
- 4Change Generous Saver 12
- Frontier Utilities Online Secure 6
How to find the right energy plan for your apartment
The good news is, households that use under 1000 kWh/month can find very affordable plans. Take a close look at tiered rate plans, like the 4Change Generous Saver 12. Tiered plans are typically designed to be more affordable for households with lower energy usage. For customers in the Oncor service territory that use roughly 880 kWh of energy per month, the 4Change plan will cost only about $80/month, including all base charges and TDSP charges. Rates may vary slightly for shoppers in other areas.
The other good news about tiered plans for low energy users: if you end up using more than 1000 kWh in one month, your bill probably isn’t going to spike — the supply rate for 1000-2000 tends to be even cheaper, so your total bill will increase only marginally.
The Frontier Utilities Online Secure 6 is another plan that delivers exceptionally low rates, even for low users of electricity. The average price per kilowatt-hour for this plan is only 8.6 cents — one of the lowest rates you’ll find.
The last thing apartment dwellers should watch out for: plans with minimum use fees. You may have heard about people unexpectedly getting hit with fees for not using enough energy — beware, these fees are sometimes buried in the fine print. Select plans without minimum use fees to make sure you’re safe from these unexpected bill-shocks.
Know your energy use
We’ve said it a thousand times and we’ll say it again, the best way to ensure you’re not surprised by your monthly bill is to get a grip on your monthly electricity usage. Know how much energy you tend to use each month and check out how much that tends to change by season.
Read on to learn about how to shop for energy for your Texas home:
