Save Money – Install A Tankless Water Heater

It’s 7:00A.M. and I’m tired. I stumble into the shower and stand under the hot, steamy water. I get almost done and the water goes ice cold. I mean bone-chilling cold. I hurry and finish, get dressed and rush off to work. I get busy and forget about my morning problem. The next day, I’m showering once again, the water is hot as can be. I remembered that yesterday the water had gone icy cold. Must have been a fluke, I thought, as the water is plenty hot today. Fast forward to day number three… it was like the movie Groundhog Day. I get almost done with my shower and the water goes cold. This is crazy, I thought. So naturally, I called a plumber.

The next day the plumber shows up. After a while he finds me and says “I have good news, I found the problem. The filter in the faucet was clogged. I cleaned it out and everything is working fine. The bad news is, I think your hot water heater is going bad.” As it turns out, a piece of pvc piping in the water heater was breaking down and being dispersed to our water faucets, eventually clogging them. The water heater was about 8 years old and probably needed to be replaced.

I asked the plumber if knew anything about Tankless Water Heaters. I had read about their efficiency and knew a couple of people who had them installed. As it turns out he was a Rinnai dealer and had experience installing them. After discussing my options with him, I decided to get the Tankless Water Heater installed, instead of the traditional tank version.

Since having the Rinnai water heater installed, we are enjoying a 30+% decrease in our monthly gas bill. Real savings! We love the endless hot water. You can do laundry, wash dishes and shower at the same time and never run out of hot water.

Tankless Advantages

• Save up to 40% on your energy bill
• Typically last 20 years, 2x as long as a tank heater
• Endless supply of hot water
• Space savings, it’s about the size of a suitcase mounted on the wall

Disadvantage

• The unit is a little noisy. We had it installed in our utility room, so it’s not that noticeable.

One of the deciding factors for me was the tax credit on energy-efficient home improvements. You can save 30% of the purchase price, up to $1500 on your tax bill until December 31, 2010.  Check out the tax credit here ** Seek advice from a tax professional.

Here is the bottom line:

The unit cost: $2160.00
Tax credit:        $648.00 (30%)
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Net cost:         $1512.00

I am estimating a $300 per year savings in our household (it’s been installed for 6 months). The cost on a good energy efficient traditional water heater was about $750.00 installed. So the net difference in cost was about $762.00. It will take 2 1/2 years to recoup the difference. Then, we will hopefully get another 15 – 17 years of monthly savings!

As a side note, we charged the unit on our 1% cash back rewards VISA. Made $21.50. I then transferred the balance to a 12 month, 0% interest deal. Yes, I know, those deals are harder to find these days, but there are still some around. This is my preferred way of making major purchases, using OPM…Other Peoples Money.   REMEMBER, this method of payment is risky. If you want to play along at home…ALWAYS pay off the balance before it’s due or you will pay some serious finance charges making everything you just read totally irrelevant.

What do you think? Have you heard about the energy efficient tax credit? Ever thought about installing a tankless water heater?

Tagged as: OPM • rinnai • Saving Money • tankless water heater