Pre-paying for propane

[Mosey]

For those of you who heat with propane, you may be able to save some money by pre-paying for it in the fall. I started doing this 2 years ago and have been saving a bundle of money. For example, in Sep 02 I pre-paid for enough to get through the winter at 99 cents a gal. I just got it topped off. If I had not pre-paid it would have cost me $1.52 a gal! Check with your propane company to see if you can do this next year. You have to have a good idea of how much you normally use and it can be tough to come up with the money all at once the first year (after the first year, just save the money for next year). It also helps to add some extra, which really came in handy this year! If you don't use it all, the propane company will just credit you for it next year, so estimate high - that's better than estimating low and having to pay top dollar for it later.

The only way you could lose on this is if the price goes down over the winter - which "Ain't gonna happen!".

[Hank]

<font color="purple"> For those of you who heat with propane, you may be able to save some money by pre-paying for it in the fall </font color>

Good suggestion; we just moved to AZ where we are now using propane for heat and HW. There are three local suppliers, and only one of them offers the pre-paying option, which we intend to snarf up.

How much propane do you use in a year?

[Stoneheartfarm]

At our cabin, I always prepaid. That gas company was glad to take the money in the middle of August. Unfortunately, when they filled the tank, they charged me whatever was the current rate and just deducted it from my account. Here, I have a different supplier, and a rate lock, which is a guarantee that the price will not rise beyond a certain point during the winter heating season.

You might also look into the possibility of purchasing your own LPGas tank. When we checked it was around $1,000.00 to own the tank. But, you can then buy from whoever has the lowest price.

Steve

[chevdog]

That is very timely info - thanks. We are having the tank installed next week before we close on the new house. We'll be able to get an idea of usage by the time our cool weather rolls around again. [img]/forums/images/icons/wink.gif[/img]

[Mosey]

Hank - "How much propane do you use in a year?"

I'd have to look it up for sure, but going by memory I normally use about 700-800 gal a year. This year I'll probably end up using close to 1000 gal. The propane company loves this kind of weather!

Steve - "when they filled the tank, they charged me whatever was the current rate and just deducted it from my account"

That's not how it's supposed to work! Good point. Yes, make sure you get the price locked in when you pre-pay!

[Stoneheartfarm]

Danny,

I have a different supplier now. [img]/forums/images/icons/wink.gif[/img] It was a bit of a shock when they told me it was $2.29 a gallon for the fuel they'd delivered [img]/forums/images/icons/mad.gif[/img] and that I'd already paid for. Our new supplier hasn't gone over $1.19 all winter and is locked at around $1.29, without prepaying. They also offer metered service. They place a regular gas meter on the house and just keep the tank full. You pay for only what you use. The old supplier still hasn't figured out how to lock a price.

Our usage from the middle of November to the second week of February was 265 gallons. If I ever get the storm doors on and patch up a couple of insulation problems I found, hopefully I can cut it down a little bit.

[wingnut]

Sounds as bad as mine, Steve .... I'm going to have to look at what I did in Alberta ... can a company called Window Doctor come in and build me "magenetic inserts" for every window ... IIRC, it came to about $3k but I think that paid for itself in about 3 years ... and that was at the low Alberta natural gas prices. These $1.25/gal propane prices are enough to give a guy a heart attack.
My wife passed up the "lock-in" offer, again, last summer ... I guarantee you it won't happen again this summer. $0.99 is certainly smaller than $1.25!
Wonder if there's an effective way to insulate a crawl space (without making it airtight and dangerous).

pete

[Stoneheartfarm]

Pete,

About the best I've found is to wrap it in foam and make foam plugs to fit in the crawl space vents. You should also insulate your floor, whether the crawlspace is insulated or not. Floor insulation is one thing I didn't get done. I also have a short hallway against an exterior wall. When insulating, I forgot that the inside wall should be treated as an exterior wall due to the construction. So, I'm getting quite a bit of heat loss there. That and the usual little tighten ups should help a bit. It would probably help more if we'd close the door when loading or unloading the car and truck. [img]/forums/images/icons/crazy.gif[/img]

Steve

[brosil]

I'd be careful pluggig the crawlspace vents. I once spent several filthy days replacing the floor beams of an apartment house because a siding company covered the vents.

[Stoneheartfarm]

I should have mentioned that you need to be able to unplug the vents in warm weather. [img]/forums/images/icons/blush.gif[/img]

Steve