My husband and I are buying a older home that is around 1,000 sq. ft. with 6 rooms to heat. With the cost of fuel so high we are thinking of taking out the monitor heat and replaceing it with electric baseboard heat. I actually know very little about this heat, and was wondering about how much does the cost of each baseboard heater element is. I know there is probably several different styles and price ranges, I just want a base rate... this is going to be what we heat with for about 5 years until we can afford to put in a heat pump. Thank you in advance.;)

Exactly what kind of fuel are you burning now?
How efficient is your heating system now.

It has a monitor heater in it now (we haven't moved in yet) it is in the living room, and dosen't warm the entire house, with kids we need to keep the house reasonably warm. Thanks for responding

So you have some sort of a space heater.

For a accurate price in your area for just the baseboard heaters and thermostats I suggest you stop by a Lowe's or Home Depot this way you can get a accurate price. Also you will need wire and circuit breakers for your electric panel since they will require there own circuits.

You can also do the Google search engine to find sales on the net. Prices vary all over the place depending upon the quality of unit but remember this. A electric heat is 100% efficient no matter how fancy a unit is. The cheap and expensive have the same operating costs basically.

Thank you hvac! I am sure we will go with the cheap over the expensive, anyhow.:D

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Originally Posted by boshii

Thank you hvac!! I am sure we will go with the cheap over the expensive, anyhow.:D

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Yes, go with the cheaper baseboards over the more expensive models. Don't buy into any efficiency garbages as they're all 100% efficient. You may however run into some sizing challenges as not all rooms will need the same size unit and baseboards come in may wattage sizes.

If you are looking at a 5 year timeframe I would consider total cost of ownership (TCO) over 5 years for each system.

TCO for just baseboards = initial cost of baseboards + installation costs (wiring, upgraded service panel, drywall work if any, etc.) + elevated electricity usage

TCO for heat pump = initial cost of unit + installation costs (ductwork, tstat, wiring) + lower electricity usage + finance costs if you can do a loan.

If you have natural gas in your area a furnace may have a lower 5 year TCO than the other two options.