These days, households around the country and right here in Modesto are struggling to get by, and any amount of savings can help. That’s why it can be so frustrating when you receive your monthly water bill and find that you’re being charged way more than you expected. Fortunately, there are a few ways to prevent that from happening.
As any business that provides plumbing services in Modesto, CA will tell you, there are a lot of reasons why your home water bill might seem unusually high. Here are a few common things that can cause high water bills, as well as some advice on how to curb them.
Detecting leaks
The most common causes of high water bills are leaks somewhere in the plumbing system. Those leaks can be in a pipe, your sink faucet, your toilet, your hot water heater or anywhere else in your home. To detect a leak, either have a business that offers plumbing services in Modesto, CA come inspect your home, or do it yourself by checking anywhere water runs in your home.
Once you’ve found the source of the leak, it’s time to patch it. Of course, there are plumbing services in Modesto, CA that can do this for you. But it’s also a fairly easy project to take on yourself. You can even buy a kit at your local hardware store specifically for patching leaks. However, it is important to keep in mind that leaks can be indicative of a larger problem, such as old, faulty pipes. Keep an eye on the situation, and if things get worse, call a plumber right away.
Reading your water meter
If you can’t find any leaks, and you feel confident that you haven’t been using a significantly greater amount of water than before you got such a high water bill, then it’s time to consider whether your water meter might be the problem. Water meters measure how much water your household goes through, and they are usually quite accurate. However, it’s certainly possible that your water meter is faulty, especially if it is an older model.
Most water services will refund your large bill if you can prove that your water meter was inaccurate, so it’s definitely worth looking into. If nothing else, try having it replaced and see if your bill goes down next month.
Conserving water
If you’ve done everything you can to ensure that you don’t have leaks or a broken water meter and are still unsatisfied with your water bill, it might just be time to try using less water. This is especially true in Modesto, given that California is currently enduring a severe drought.
There are a few easy ways to both save money and do your part in conserving water: switch off your ice machine when you don’t need ice, use low flow shower heads and toilets, keep your showers short and convert your yard from a lawn to a surface that needs less water. It may seem challenging at first, but once you become more aware of it, you’ll find there are dozens of little things you can do to help save water.