super high electric bill

Well I got my electric bill the other day and it was $284, which is waaaay more than it used to be even when I had 4 people living here so I called the electric company and she told me it could be the heat pump or hot water heater ect, so I called my plumber and he told me if one heating element was out, the other one would stay on all the time. I took off the covers and lo and behold, the bottom element was melted, and the wire was melted in two?? so I fixed it by changing the lower element and both thermostats, fingers crossed for the next bill.

Glad you caught it early. I had a similar issue when we moved into a new house. Fortunately the element that burnt in two kicked off the breaker periodically when it would brush the side of the tank. Not nice to have happen but with it being a new to us house it would likely have taken several bills to sort it out.

I put a timer on my hot water heater years ago, it only stays on for 4 hours each day, 2 in the morning 2 in the evenings..If you have a large family it might need to stay on longer. That would eliminate a problem with a heating element staying on all the time..But I know some folks whose light bills are higher than that each month..

Check your power company's website. My electric co-op lets me track usage daily with a 24 hour lapse between results. IOW, I have to wait til tomorrow afternoon to see today's usage but then it breaks it down into a 24 hour graph. I also have alerts programmed(by me) to send me a text and email alert whenever my usage exceeds $3 during the day. This month it was $109, last month was $85. Bear in mind I'm the only one using the electricity now but the average, even for last year with 3 of us here most of the year, was $200.

When I discovered the usage charts/alerts I started recording daily power activities, like cooking, WH, laundry, etc. Pretty eye opening. Now I cut the WH on for an hour every other day and still have plenty for dishes and showers. I also burn wood for heat. I've had days since I started watching it when my power usage was as low as 85 cents.

Hope that fixes you high electric bill issues.


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When we built our house we installed a tankless hot water heater. Its a pretty significant cost up-front, but they'll last for decades and only heat water when you turn on the tap.