Anyone have experience with electric baseboard heating? If so, do/did you like it? How bad was your electric bill from using electric heat? Are they efficient or just a PITA?

 

I have a small apartment with electric heat. It sucks.

Electric bill spikes during heating season, and there is very little control over the temperature range with the old mercury switch dials. If you can, try to get digital switches installed.

That said it will get a room hot very fast, so i guess thats good.

 

What was your electric bill like in general? Was it pretty expensive or all in all did you find it reasonable. Im talking in the winter cause obviously the heat will be off in the summer. The place Im going to look at I believe has electric controls in each room.

 

im a electrician by trade and install baseboard heat alot in homes. heres some things to think about and what i tell customers.

- how often will you use it?
- is this going to be your primary source of heat?
- can you wire them as a 220 unit if so, they'll use less energy.

baseboard heat works well in well insulated areas and when the the controls are digital ( wall mount, this will give a better reading then a thermostat mounted on the unit ). if you cant get digital controls for the unit your looking at dont go for the cheapest way out on the controls.

just remember its better to leave a room , comfortable then too hot to avoid extreme electric bills. the hotter you go and keep changing the temp. the harder they will have to work to get the room to your desired temp.

hope this helps .

 

The house im going to look at uses baseboard heat as the primary heat source. The place was newly remodeled so common sense assumes that they installed new insulation (hopefully) before they installed the drywall. Its a smaller house so its not like I would have to heat a giant house with the baseboard heaters. Mainly I would like to figure out what kind of bill I would be looking at if I were to get the place and how efficient the heaters are, like will they need to be cranked up real high just to heat the room or do they heat relatively efficiently.

 

 

the only issue with electric heating is that its about 3 times the price of gas, my parents always said you wouldn't be able to afford electric heating, so i stayed away from houses with those when i bought mine, luckily when i got my new house it was a newly converted from electric to gas, about 1 year before i bought it

 

we have electric, and in our house it can really raise the electric bill. the nice parts about it is its much quieter than a conventional furnace, and you never run out of fuel.... unless the power goes out. personally, im still all for a woodstove, eather a freestanding unit or a fireplace insert. when we have ours lit, our thermostats are close to being off, and the house is very comfertable. you can get a years supply of wood cut & split for about what a month or 2 of just running the basebord will cost ya. if ya wind up with that house, matt, i would say a woodstove would be a GREAT upgrade.

 

Let me ask this.
for years now Debbie will turn the thermostat down to about 50 when she leaves for work. A friend said he thought it was better to turn the thermostat down some when you leave, but not down as much as Debbie lowers it. His reasoning being the amount it takes to make the house comfortable again when we get back.
Not to mention the amount of time it takes for this to happen as well.
we looked in to level billing just last year. They said if we took it, our gas bill would go up compared to what we're paying now.



A friend just got a $98 gas bill for his mom's house. She passed away last spring. He said he's kept the house and 55 degrees. Not warm, but not cold either. He also said the city charged for 2,000 gal of water last month. Remember, she passed away last spring. Almost 1 year ago.

My parents have one of those Edenpure heaters. It's okay and all but it puts out such dry heat, it gives me headaches to be around it.
They have had a portable baseboard heater we've used from time to time. They don't like it cause they say all the heat goes straight up instead of warming the room.

 

Thanks guys for the input. Ill probably get my agent to ask the seller what the average electric bill is there when it was occupied. I dont think it has been occupied since it was remodeled so that may not work. If it doesnt I will contact the electric company.

Space, this house doesnt have a garage, but it is a double lot with room to grow.