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[quote=”dundalk1″]I recently rented out my condo again in Tamarindo, shocked to get the electric bill today which is $320 for the last month.
I know Aprils a hot month so lots of air con being used but that seems outrageously high. Is that normal for the area ? Thanks[/quote]
I know a dude with a big house, 2 a/c units and a pool.$700-$850/mo.
When you have thieves running the show that’s what you get.
It’s 3 cents a KWH in Oregon.
http://livinglifeincostarica.blogspot.com/2013/02/electricity-rates-cr.htmlI agree, quite scary to think about it.
If they ever considered to run a nuclear plant, I would move somewhere else.
[quote=”sweikert925″]How does Costa Rica generate most of its power? Coal? Hydro? I’m guessing NOT nuclear.
Oops, should have googled first and then asked:
http://godutchrealty.com/blog/Costa-Rica-Power-generation.html
There are articles on this site too …
Costa Rica’s Renewable Energy
Alternative Energy in Costa Rica: Solar energy.
Costa Rica Energy – Our actions have serious consequences.
New Wind Energy Project For Costa Rica
Costa Rica Energy – ICE study and the State of the Nation
Costa Rica Energy – Wind power
Costa Rica Water & Electricity Problems. April 2007Scott
I would like to suggest that we are all missing the real, long-term plan here which is to deliberately allow a rapid increase in electricity rates to a level where the people and businesses are clamouring for help which will be when Costa Rica will be forced to open the market to private electricity companies who will enter and offer “cheaper” and more efficient electricity supplies….
Oscar Arias and his family have been promoting the opening of the market for years.
[url=http://www.semanario.ucr.ac.cr/index.php/component/content/article/907-Pa%C3%ADs/2824-empresarios-meten-presion-a-proyecto-de-electricidad-de-los-arias.html]Sectores empresariales privados creen que el proyecto de Ley General de Electricidad[/url] impulsado por el exmandatario Óscar Arias y su hermano Rodrigo – exministro de la Presidencia – es la propuesta que más se acerca a sus intereses.
“Just because you’re paranoid, doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you ….”
Scott
Interesting article in today’s La Nacion
[url=http://www.nacion.com/2013-05-21/ElPais/Prolongado-verano-dispara-la-generacion-electrica-con-bunker.aspx#]Prolongado verano dispara la generación eléctrica con búnker[/url]
[youtube][/youtube][img]https://www.welovecostarica.com/public/images/Prolongado_Verano.jpg[/img]
Scott
sweikert925
what exactly are you looking for??? :shock::shock::shock:
you already have an idea of costs related to living here as per your research
what you spend will eventually come down to personal choices. Whether you shop at the feria or go to the supermarket for example
again this over analyzing paralysis does not help you any further aside from a feeling of false confidence
why don’t you spend some time in costa rica instead worrying what prices will be in the next few years.
all this pre information may be all moot
when you come down and after a year or so you wind up hating it for all the different reasons you were initially researching
does not make any sense
stop mentally masturbating and take some action dude.
:wink::wink::wink::wink::wink::wink::wink::wink::wink
[quote=”sweikert925″]I’ve read many of the comments and download library documents on welovecostarica.com to get a sense of what it may cost me to live here but it’s a little hard to quantify it so I was hoping we could broaden the topic under discussion here to the general cost of living in Costa Rica.
I downloaded the document by Lair Davis that detailed his costs for a 5 year period (2007-2011) but it’s hard to put that in context. I take it he is (was?) a single man so his expenses are for one person but without knowing more about what his housing arrangements are it’s hard to know whether the household expense related expenses translate to my situation and in any case the figures are now between 2 and 7 years old.
I also visit an excellent website called retireforlessincostarica.com where the proprietors have helpfully detailed their monthly expenses every month for the past several years. (I’ve asked them permission to post those detailed figures here but haven’t heard back from them yet). However their expenses for food and utilities are currently about $350/month and $262/month respectively. Their food budget doesn’t seem to have changed much for the past 3 years but their utility expenses are up about $100/month since 2011. Is that in line with what the rest of you are seeing in your cost of living?
It seems that the official inflation rate for Costa Rica has dropped dramatically since the 80s and since the cost of living is the #1 reason for my tentative decision to emigrate there, this is a figure I intend to keep close watch on for the next few years. Here is the World Bank’s compilation of Costa Rican inflation sicne 1980:
http://www.indexmundi.com/costa_rica/inflation_rate_(consumer_prices).html
(I know posting this will probably get me in trouble with the self-appointed welovecostarica.com message board moderators, but what the hell, you only live once).
update: Actualy here’s a better website to get CR inflation figures as it allows you to change the dates from month to month.
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/costa-rica/inflation-cpi%5B/quote%5D
We own a 1400 sq ft. bedroom condo in Playa Flamingo that we rent out. Since Dec. 2012, our monthly bills have ranged anywhere between $550 and $887. We weren’t prepared for this financial hit! I don’t know if renters have the AC at full blast with balcony doors open or what! But the kilowatt usage is 4x as much as our usage in a single family home last August in the mid-Atlantic states. Any suggestions?:x
[quote=”Dodiefae”]We own a 1400 sq ft. bedroom condo in Playa Flamingo that we rent out. Since Dec. 2012, our monthly bills have ranged anywhere between $550 and $887. We weren’t prepared for this financial hit! I don’t know if renters have the AC at full blast with balcony doors open or what! But the kilowatt usage is 4x as much as our usage in a single family home last August in the mid-Atlantic states. Any suggestions?:x[/quote]
Obviously, the renters are staying nice & cool – at your expense!
What some folks do in our area is provide an “allowance” for electricity of, say, $250 or $300 per month, and then when you rent the unit out you also collect a “utility deposit” of $300 or so. Anything over the “allowance” would be deducted from the utility deposit.
Of course this would have to be spelled out quite clearly in your rental agreement, and if it a long term rental (several months) the renters would have to replenish the utility deposit if you have to use any of it to pay amounts over the allowance amount.
Sorry to say, [b]Dodiefae[/b] your high power bill, is not uncommon. Floridian friends who insist on using A/C, in the interior of Guanacaste are paying even more, and others at Esterillos are saying that they cannot afford to rent their condo.
Unfortunately when renting out your condo, it must be very difficult to gauge how much extra to charge, when you have to wait until you have received a bill and then hope you can recoup.
For a long term rental, the tenants could be told the rent does not include utilities.
Good news it that the cost is supposed to be going down…These folk reside in a cooler area of Costa Rica so the electric bill should be much less than in a warmer /hotter area of the country…but it has risen quite a bit.
Well thats interesting. I do not have such detail but I thought that I’d mention at my small 2 bedroom rental house in San Joaquin , Heredia my Elecrtic averages $20-24, phone & DSL (512kb) $20 and digital cable/HBO $20 my landlord pays $38 for basic analog cable and water. So my utilities are less then $100 month! Love it In Atlanta I spent $200-350 a month on gas. water & elcetric. SCS
Oh, by the way, pray for a heavy rainy season. One of the problems is that Lake Arenal is way down and not ‘doing its part’ in generating power.
We turned off our fans as they wasn’t really necessarily and our power use dropped off, significantly.
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