Q about power usage for building a house

[hussein]

I live in this great house and my landlord did something that I never expected, using our electricity to build his house just off our backyard without telling us.

We talked to him and he told us that there is no way those tools are using that much power, and failed to mention the added connection to us even when we asked him before confronting him about the cord we saw. The situation isn't solved yet but I would like to find out if this makes sense.

There was a generator there, but a very small rectangle box one. None of us realized when they stopped using it. We are also going to check how much power we use on Sunday to make sure that it's not something in the house. Although, it still doesn't explain why we weren't told about it, and why he was so defensive!!!! He only admitted up to 1 month of this being connected.

We have had an average for many months of 1500 kwh and then all of a sudden it doubled and then even went a bit higher than doubling, up to 2000 kwh more, bringing us in at one month to 3500 kwh!!

The house is made of wood, it has the wooden looking appearance, and it is in Antigua. 3-5 men working 5-6 days a week. The roof is complete. My room mate said its between 10-15 yards long, but we don't know for sure.

There was at least 3 handheld circle saws on the roof today and then at least one big saw inside.

Our power usage from 10:30 pm last night to 10:30 pm tonight (first entry in our log) is 83 kwh.

3 persons house, we run a water pump for the water, 1 a/c in the master. There is an 1100 watt ac in 2 of the other bedrooms that run about 12 hours a day each max now ever since our bills became so high, we all just use the master bedroom during the day for ac and studying. But before 1 of them was on for up to 18 hours a day previously.

Do saws run for that many hours a day? Do you think this this the source?

Thanks for your input. I hate to have to pay for power we did not use, what makes it worse is that it seems he wasn't planning on telling us, so it seems hard to think the extra use is coming from within the house.

EDIT: I forgot to mention that when there was only 1 person in the house plus me here for 2 weeks the power use was around 200 kwh more than when all 3 of us are here. He said they just started the other day, and then it was a week, and then he said a month, and then he said he doesn't know, and that if I remember when I put gas in my car last, lol.

[Alterac]

Turn off his circuit, send him the bill.
Expect payment for 50% of it for the last month.

Only fair way to do it.

And keep his power off unless he agree's to pay 100% of your electrical bill during construction.

The power bill is in your name, not the landlords right?

Charge him for theft :D hah. (joke)

[black_shadow_18]

i think he should be paying for half as well. power tools do add up fast, compresors, lights, saws, etc. if it was negligable, why would the electricity companies worry about putting meters on new home contruction. And I'll bet you they stopped using that little generator because it couldnt give them enough power to run all of there equipment.

[Masked Bandit]

Just shut the breaker off?

[Thaco]

turn the breaker off until he pays you.

[Ichigo]

Would this classify as stealing electricity? Or some type of breach of contract in the rental agreement?

[Tik-Tok]

A) Shut the breaker off (but likely he will het himself in and turn it back on)

-or-

B) Buy one of these, plug it in and show him how much his house building is using.

http://www.powermeterstore.com/crm_uploads/kill-a-watt_ez_front_side-500x440.jpg

I can't believe 3 power saws were going all on one single circuit, that would normally trip a regular 15amp CB.

[ntvinh986]

Originally posted by hussein
I live in this great house and my landlord did something that I never expected, using our electricity to build his house just off our backyard without telling us.

We talked to him and he told us that there is no way those tools are using that much power, and failed to mention the added connection to us even when we asked him before confronting him about the cord we saw. The situation isn't solved yet but I would like to find out if this makes sense.

There was a generator there, but a very small rectangle box one. None of us realized when they stopped using it. We are also going to check how much power we use on Sunday to make sure that it's not something in the house. Although, it still doesn't explain why we weren't told about it, and why he was so defensive!!!! He only admitted up to 1 month of this being connected.

We have had an average for many months of 1500 kwh and then all of a sudden it doubled and then even went a bit higher than doubling, up to 2000 kwh more, bringing us in at one month to 3500 kwh!!

The house is made of wood, it has the wooden looking appearance, and it is in Antigua. 3-5 men working 5-6 days a week. The roof is complete. My room mate said its between 10-15 yards long, but we don't know for sure.

There was at least 3 handheld circle saws on the roof today and then at least one big saw inside.

Our power usage from 10:30 pm last night to 10:30 pm tonight (first entry in our log) is 83 kwh.

3 persons house, we run a water pump for the water, 1 a/c in the master. There is an 1100 watt ac in 2 of the other bedrooms that run about 12 hours a day each max now ever since our bills became so high, we all just use the master bedroom during the day for ac and studying. But before 1 of them was on for up to 18 hours a day previously.

Do saws run for that many hours a day? Do you think this this the source?

Thanks for your input. I hate to have to pay for power we did not use, what makes it worse is that it seems he wasn't planning on telling us, so it seems hard to think the extra use is coming from within the house.

EDIT: I forgot to mention that when there was only 1 person in the house plus me here for 2 weeks the power use was around 200 kwh more than when all 3 of us are here. He said they just started the other day, and then it was a week, and then he said a month, and then he said he doesn't know, and that if I remember when I put gas in my car last, lol.

Hi guys, Im a newbie. Nice to join this forum.

[autosm]

Tell him you want one month free rent or you are going to push the issue.

[hussein]

The wire on the right that is hanging goes inside the house to the AC.

The wire going down is to the construction site.

It is 220 they have it going to small box just before the site.