calculating gas/electric costs

ben.joanna0904

Hi,
Myself and my partner are looking into getting our first flat together however as we have both always stayed with family or in student accom with bills provided I am struggling to work out what to expect my gas and electric bills to come out and obviously monthly bill amounts will impact on how much we can spend on a flat per month as we dont want to be overstretched.

Any ideas how I can make the estimate or is there a website somewhere that we could use to work this out?

I know that anything we come out with here will be a estimate rather than set in stone but it does give us a rough idea of where we will stand financially.

many thanks

paulonline123

ben.joanna0904 wrote: »

Hi,
Myself and my partner are looking into getting our first flat together however as we have both always stayed with family or in student accom with bills provided I am struggling to work out what to expect my gas and electric bills to come out and obviously monthly bill amounts will impact on how much we can spend on a flat per month as we dont want to be overstretched.

Any ideas how I can make the estimate or is there a website somewhere that we could use to work this out?

I know that anything we come out with here will be a estimate rather than set in stone but it does give us a rough idea of where we will stand financially.

many thanks

Check your meter. Your gas meter if its 5 dial costs about 35p per unit and if its 4 dial about 1.15 (the difference is imperial and metric, same length on a 30cm or twelve inch ruler). Your electric meter is about 15p per unit.

Give it a week or two and you'll see your usage. If your using gas to heat then at this time of the year i would work out your month figure and times it by 1.5, that should be cool as a monthly DD for the year.

Obviously check bills against the meter every quarter and work out what you want from your supplier based upon what your usage is.

you can use this:

http://www.ukpower.co.uk/running-costs-elec.asp

If your hardcore but I would just budget for bills in the region of 100 pounds a month for gas and elec in a flat as very often they are not energy efficient.

Its a difficult thing to say i've lived in flats with just elec in it that range from 40 pounds a month to 100 pounds per month, same square footage, same appliances.

Cardew

There are so many factors to consider that it is all but impossible to give an answer.

Type of heating oil, gas, electric?

Size of property?

Insulation?

Baths/showers?

Time spent in property/ how warm you like it?

The UK average is £1,200pa, I suppose a working couple in a small flat should budget £800 but that could be way out either way.

ben.joanna0904

is hard to go on the bills we already get as we are staying with family, have a 3 storey (well 4 if you count basement) old house with 5 people, 1 of whom stays at home all day working frm the computer, one of whom works night shifts so there is usually always someone up. they love the heating up high while I throw open all the windows in our room because it is so warm and they leave lights on for days at a time, tv is pretty much never turned off, nor is the radio...
Myself and my partner generally both work 9-5.30 so out the house from the back of 8 until back of 7 or thereabouts and I am very concsious about turning things off etc and wearing jumpers rather than turning heating up an extra notch!

ben.joanna0904

just thought there might be some sort of calculatory thing as I found one to see if it would be worth the pair of us going onto water meter

Cardew

The biggest variables will be the size of the flat, quality of insulation and method of heating.

1carminestocky

...not to mention lifestyle choices.

justjames_3

My girlfriend and I are in the same boat, trying to work costs out so we don't overstretch.

I found http://www.uswitch.com/Energy/ helpful as you can put in a postcode for the area that you are looking and find the providers, then say "no details handy", under the "your usage" bit. Then on the next page it asks you about the type of place you live in, how many people, when your at home etc and and gives you an average usage based on your answers.

When I was working it out I took one middle prices and added on a little bit to allow for any price rises and have based costs on that and hopefully it'll be ok. Ours came in at a combined cost of £90 a month in a 3 bed terraced with a fairly new boiler.

lkk88

Hi
May or may not be any use to you but I have just set up the utilities for a 2bed house I moved into last week - the energy companies just estimate it for the 1st few months until they have meter readings to base it on, then the payments could go up or down. I'm paying by monthly DD and these were the questions I was asked and my prices for the moment:

Questions we were asked for water was showers or baths, do we use a hosepipe, do we have a dishwasher/washing machine etc and based on 2 people having showers with no hosepipe or dishwasher just a washing machine our water is £12 a month and the sewerage £16 a month (I might of got that the wrong way round but its £28 combined anyway and we are on a water metre)

Our gas is £39 a month with scottish power (which was above what i had allowed for) and thats with a gas hob and gas central heating
Our electricity with Eon is £25 a month - we do not have storage heaters - if you have these which a lot of flats have now the electricity will be much higher.

We like you are out 9am-5pm - I hope this helps a little bit! but obviously at the moment prices are not stable at all and I am expecting most of mine to increase in the next few months!