Pete Sickman-Garner and his daughter Robin with their new high efficiency freezer. After getting rid of a 25-year old energy hogging fridge, insulating their house, and putting in new storm windows, their gas and electric bills are much lower. (Photo by Rebecca Williams)
One thing is clear… energy prices are just going to keep going up. If you’ve been thinking about making your house more energy efficient, now’s the time. That’s because a federal tax credit will be running out in a few months. Rebecca Williams has more:
Transcript
One thing is clear… energy prices are just going to keep going up. If you’ve been thinking about making your house more energy efficient, now’s the time. That’s because a federal tax credit will be running out in a few months. Rebecca Williams has more:
Pete Sickman-Garner didn’t have any trouble finding the leaks in his house. It was built in the 1940’s… with pretty much zero insulation.
“It was cold! There were nights my daughter woke up because she was had rolled over and touched the wall and it was so cold it woke her up.”
And there were those huge gas and electric bills in the dead of winter. He says he and his wife knew they really needed to seal up the house. So they hired a guy to blow insulation into the walls. And they put up new storm windows.
“It was roughly a $4000 home improvement so not insignificant. But so far we’ve gotten back $900 on our gas bill… it should pay for itself easily within 5 years.”
And on top of that they got a tax credit.
There was a pretty huge tax incentive last year for making your home more energy efficient… and it’s happening again this year. But it’s winding down. You only have eight months left.
Here’s how it works: the government will essentially pay you to make your home more efficient. Little purchases like weather stripping count. Bigger things like insulation and storm windows do too. And so do the really big things like a new furnace or central air conditioner. You can get a tax credit for 30 percent of the cost of these things… up to 15-hundred dollars total for all of your purchases. That’s money sliced right off your tax bill.
But like most things with the word “tax” in them… these home energy tax credits can get complicated.
Insulation and air conditioners and windows have to meet certain codes. You can’t go by the Energy Star label alone. On top of that… you can include the cost of installing heating and cooling equipment in your tax credit. But you can’t include those installation costs for anything else. So here’s where it’s good to call in a tax credit pro to help you wade through the details.
Ronnie Kweller is with the Alliance to Save Energy.
“When you go shopping, definitely ask the retailer: do these items qualify for the federal tax credits?”
Kweller says the best place to start is to make sure you have enough insulation for your climate. And then, seal up the little leaks in your house. You could pay three to five hundred dollars for an energy audit. Or… you can try this trick: close all the windows and doors… turn on your kitchen and bathroom exhaust fans. And then:
“Light, say, a stick of incense and just walk around the perimeter of your house on the inside, holding incense around the edges of windows and doors and if you see smoke blowing in towards you whether or not you can feel air coming in, you’ll know there is some air leak.”
She says sealing up those leaks can save you as much as 20 percent on your energy bills.
And a lot of the little – and big – things you do can count toward your 15-hundred dollar credit.
The thing is, most people tend to think about their taxes at the end of the year. Unfortunately for some businesses… that means they’re slammed when the weather’s the worst.
Donna Napolitano runs Mechanical Energy Systems. They sell all kinds of high efficiency heating and cooling equipment. She says people were squeaking in their big purchases right up until December last year.
“It was crazy here! We were installing every day and we had to combat against the weather, I mean hello, summer’s here it’s a great time to put systems in now!”
Unless this tax credit gets extended… you only have a few more months. Everything has to be paid for and installed by December 31st. So if you’re a procrastinator… you might want to start thinking about your projects sometime soon.
For The Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.
“By the way… if you want to do extremely efficient installations like solar panels and geothermal heating and cooling systems, that 30-percent tax credit is not capped at 15-hundred dollars and does not run out this year.”
