So last week I began the process of completing the energy audit that the city of Austin Mandates for all multi family properties inside the city.   The City passed an energy audit ordnance and it says that by June 1 you need to do an energy audit on your property and then you going to need to disclose the results to the prospective tenants.   So after calling a few energy audit companies.   I settled on one 1stchoiceenergy.com David Malone is the owner and they can be reached at  512-762-5000 and his website is www.1stchoiceenergy.com

It took them about an hour to do the energy audit they needed to go in each one of the individual floor plans that I have in each building.   Luckily enough for me at my small complex here in Austin. I have four buildings and they each have the same floor plan.   Once inside they look at the insulation in the attic and also do a duct test on the air ducts and also make an observation of the windows to determine what their energy efficiency.   Once I get the City and I get the results we will be able to determine where I can spend some money so that my tenants will save on their energy bill and where the city can reduce energy usage.   (I am still trying to see the return on investment for me I guess I am simple like that!)   My understanding is that if your property does not meet the minimum qualifications for energy usage then the city will give you about 18 months to go through and make some energy improvements and they have some rebate programs right now for property owners to help offset the costs!   I look forward to finding out about the rebates and the costs to complete some of the energy savings upgrades.

I understand that the purpose of the audits is to help Austin save energy and so by having more energy efficient and by building energy-efficient homes the city of Austin hopes to save little bit of energy usage and hopefully prolong having to build a new electric power plant.    Austin is a very “green” city as some of you may well know and so it is doing its best to help the property owners in Austin make energy improvements.   When single family homes are being sold, well before they actually go under contract the owners need to conduct an energy audit and disclose that information to the buyers.   All except the foreclosures, I guess banks cant afford to be energy efficient or cant afford the energy audits so they are exempt! (Of course I feel that if I have to do it then everyone should have to do it!)

Anyway, enough of my ranting about that.   So the audit cost me about $40 per door so not extremely expensive until you start adding up the number of doors!   So I will give you an update on when I know more about the repairs needed and the rebates from the city.   Come back and see how this new adventure plays it self out!