Baseboard Heat - all electric Unit

ltone235

I live in a 4 unit apartment building. Each unit is 1 bedroom, 1 bath, kitchen and living room and approximately same sq footage. All units are baseboard heat--we pay electric only. I live on one of the bottom units. since moving in October 1, my electric bill has significantly increased each month up to and over 200 hundred dollars. One tenant moved in november 1, 3rd tenant December, and 4th tenant Mid January. there are 4 separate meters outside. My meter is registering a bit higher than everyone elses. Upstairs tenants bill has been been consistently no more than 15.00 dollars a month while mine steady increasing. I've done actual reads, tried shutting off panels to see if anyone elses lights are affected which they weren't. I am gone 8-10 hrs a day and don't have electronics or things plugged in. I don't understand why my bill is so high. Is it possible that somehow other units wiring is connected to mine causing my meter to register higher?

JUGHNE

Are you sure your heaters are hot water and not electric?
Usually a 4 unit building would have 5 electric meters.
The fifth one being considered the "house meter" might run the laundry, (dryer), hall lighting, electric heaters, outside lights etc.
You may have a disconnect under your meter which would shut off the panel in your apartment. That disconnect switch is not always accessible to just anyone.
If you can ID your meter and can't shut it off, you could turn off all breakers in your unit. Then see if your meter disc is turning.
Or watch it and do some laundry, an electric dryer would spin it quite well.
And it is possible the meter reader mistakenly bills the house meter to you.

JUGHNE

It looks like you changed the header to your comment?
Could you clarify if you do have electric heaters or hot water?

ratio

$200/month for an all electric apt doesn't seem too unbelievable to me, but I'm basing that on a place I lived in a few decades ago & nothing else, so take that with a grain of salt. However, $15/month is quite unbelievable, IIRC around here the monthly connect fee is higher than that!

With separately metered power, I'd expect a panel in your apt. or otherwise accessible to you alone. Flip the breakers all off & see what happens. You could turn the 15 & 20 amp (marked on the handle or face) single-pole breakers (Single width, not the double-width ones. Post a pic of the panel if you're not sure.) on one at a time & see what they control. I'd expect the baseboard to be a double-pole breaker, leave them off for now. If someone comes knocking, there you are!

Solid_Fuel_Man

Do you know if it was purpose-built as an apartment building, or was it something else originally and turned into apartments?