How I saved $60 on our electric bill

We have budget billing for our electric bill and it adjusts throughout the year based on how much electricity we are using. It doesn’t normally adjust more than $20 or so and I had never looked at how much our electricity we were using in the winter. When I did look, I realized that one month alone our bill was over $500. 

June’s bill stated that our next electric bill was going to adjust to $100 more a month. I was shocked! I even called the electric company to make sure there wasn’t a mistake. Of course, there wasn’t a mistake, we really were going to have to start paying $100 more a month in order to pay off our winter bill before next winter rolls around. I thought I was doing good at looking at ways to save on our electric bill but this bill made it obvious that we would have to do more.

While we could come up with that $100, that would be $100 less that would be going to paying off our debt so I knew we had to save on our electric bill any way we could. I made a list of ways we could reduce our usage and began implementing them. To my surprise, not only did we save money, we saved enough money that our budget billing didn’t rise that $100. We had reduced our energy consumption so much that by the time our bill actually came out it only went up $40. We saved $60 just by making a few changes!

Save money on your electric bill by actually completing your laundry. I am horrible about actually finishing a load of laundry once I start it, or I was horrible, I’ve changed recently. I would start a load of laundry, walk off, and then not think about it until the next day. In which case I would have to wash it all over again. I’ve done this three or four times with one load of laundry. I’m not lazy but the laundry is at the other end of the house and I would get involved in something else and . . . Anyway, I decided to stop this. I already dry most of my clothes around the house or outside so I was already saving what I could on the dryer. I also decided I wouldn’t put laundry in except for early in the morning or late at night and I would only do the amount I knew I could wash, dry, fold, and put away in that time period.

Save money on your electric bill by turning off the lights. We were already pretty good about this as we don’t turn on much, if any, light during the day and we only keep a light on in the room we’re in during the evening. I just tried to be even more vigilant than usual.

Save money on your electric bill by turning off electronics. I work from home and it can get pretty quiet when I’m here by myself with just the dogs so I tend to keep the TV on for company. Now I turn it off if I am going to be out of the room and I turn it off if I am just using it for mindless noise and not actually watching anything. I also turn it off at night if the hubby is listening to his audio books and I’m working. We also keep all of our small appliances unplugged and I turn off the computer every night.

Save money on your electric bill by using a toaster oven or having meals that do not require the oven.  Until a month ago we didn’t own a toaster oven. I’ve been wanting one for awhile but we didn’t have the extra cash for one. Until I received a $50 gift card to Walmart from MyPoints. I used the gift card to buy a convection oven. An awesome purchase! It takes a great deal less energy to use than the oven and it doesn’t heat up the house which keeps the AC from working harder than it needs to.  I also try to make lighter meals, such as sandwiches or salads or the crockpot, that don’t use as much electricity as the stove.

Save money on your electric bill by setting the thermostat higher and using fans.  I admit, this took some getting used to, especially as hot as it has been this summer. I began by slowly moving the thermostat up during the day. All the way to 80. Yep, you heard me, 80 degrees.  Most days anyway, some days we take it down to 78 degrees. I tend to live in tank tops and short shorts and the hubby has been walking around in shorts and no shirt. We keep the ceiling fan on in the living room and use box fans elsewhere. Keeping a fan directed at you does a lot more than you would think and significantly cools you down. At night we’ve been lowering it between 76 degrees and 78 degrees and using fans in our bedroom as well. We also have nothing but a sheet and a thin quilt on the bed and we don’t really use the quilt. I wish we didn’t have to lower it even this much at night but I could only take so many nights of waking up drenched in sweat. The hubby and I seem to be very hot sleepers!

 I was very surprised that these changes made such a big difference in our electric bill. I am going to continue to look for ways to reduce our bill and I can’t wait to see how much I can save on our electric bill this winter!