The average household in the U.S. spends about $2,060 per year on utility bills. This means that energy costs account for a huge chunk of the average household’s annual budget. Fortunately, learning how to improve your home’s energy efficiency with an energy audit can help you lower your utility bills. Before you start searching for a “professional energy audit near me,” it’s important to understand how to perform an audit for free.
What Is An Energy Audit?
A home energy audit is an assessment of how energy is consumed in your home. Performing this assessment can help you answer these questions:
- How much energy do I use at home?
- What uses the most/least energy in my home?
- Where am I wasting energy?
- How can I improve my home’s energy efficiency?
- How much can I save by improving my home’s energy efficiency?
If you want to make your home more energy-efficient, conducting an energy audit is the first step. This is because an audit will help you identify problem areas in your home that need to be addressed in order to become more energy efficient.
How Much Does A Professional Energy Audit Cost?
The cost of a professional energy audit can vary depending on a number of factors, including your location and the size of your home. Most professional audits will cost between $250 to $650.
Some utility companies offer rebates to consumers who hire a professional to perform an energy audit. However, these rebates are usually only $100 or less, which means they will not cover the entire cost of the audit.
How to Conduct A Free Home Energy Audit
Don’t let the cost of a professional home energy audit prevent you from going green and lowering your monthly utility bills. There’s no need to spend hundreds of dollars on a professional audit since you can conduct an audit for free using the HomeSelfe app. Here’s what to do:
- Download the App
- Conduct the Audit
- Review Your Personalized Report
- Make Energy Efficient Upgrades
Download the App
Head to the Google Play or Apple app store to download the HomeSelfe app on your smartphone or tablet. Once the app has finished downloading, enter your contact information to create an account and get started.
Conduct the Audit
After creating an account, a graphic that displays different rooms inside a house should appear on your screen. Tap on any of the rooms to begin your audit.
You will need to answer a series of questions in each room found on the graphic. Some examples of the questions you may need to answer include:
- Do you have a programmable thermostat?
- What are the heating and cooling settings on your thermostat?
- Is your home airy?
- Does your front door have weather stripping?
- Are your exterior walls insulated?
- Is your refrigerator ENERGY STAR® certified?
- Do you have low flow toilets?
- What is the fuel source for your water heater?
- Do you have a kitchen faucet aerator?
You will only need to answer a handful of questions per room. The audit is complete once you have answered all of the questions in each room displayed on the graphic.
It only takes about five minutes to complete the audit, so you won’t need to set aside a lot of time to mark this task off your to-do list.
Review Your Personalized Report
The app will create a personalized energy efficiency report based on your answers to the questions. In this report, you will find recommendations on how to improve your home’s energy efficiency. For example, if you said that your air ducts were not insulated, the app may recommend that you add insulation.
The report provides more than just energy-efficient recommendations. The app also estimates how much you can save by making each energy-efficient improvement on the list of recommendations. Furthermore, it tells you whether there are rebates related to the upgrade available near you.
Make Energy Efficient Upgrades
Use the information on HomeSelfe’s report to determine the best way to improve your home’s energy efficiency. It’s best to prioritize energy-efficient upgrades based on their potential savings. Focus on the upgrades that will save you the most so you can start lowering your monthly utility bills and doing your part to protect the planet.
Commit to Improving Your Home’s Energy Efficiency
You can’t make your home more energy-efficient without understanding how you consume energy at home. Take the first step towards improving your home’s energy efficiency by conducting a home energy audit using the HomeSelfe app. The sooner you conduct an audit, the sooner you can start reducing your carbon footprint and lowering your monthly utility bills!