Minor Thoughts from me to you

I just had two nice, young college age boys stop by my house. They were in the area representing a window installation company. Their company is trying to drum up business by setting up appointments for their "consultants" to tell me how their energy efficient windows will save me money on my energy bills.

That's a sales pitch that only works for those who don't think about it. I have thought about it, so I made them think about it.

I asked a simple question: "what's the payoff time? how long would it take for the new windows to pay for themselves?"

Well, they tried to duck the question. "That'd be a great question for our consultants..."

I interrupted: "Do you have a ballpark estimate?"

"No."

"Tell your consultants to send you out with a ballpark next time and I might be willing to talk." I didn't let them leave me a flyer either.

I've done the math on this before. My gas / electric bill is $170 a month. Installing new windows throughout the entire house will cost us between $2500 and $7000, depending on the make, model, and installer. It's a simple problem of division. Assuming their windows were miracle windows and eliminated my entire energy bill (hah!), it would take between 15 and 41 years for my new windows to pay for themselves.

There are many good reasons to install new windows. Energy efficiency is not one of them. Not even close.