Biiiiink

Can anyone tell me what that's all about? All the houses I'm looking at have rented HWT. Is it common? Why do people do it - are they costly, do they break often?

This cheapo house in Wpg has its own hot water tank, I'm a bit surprised to see so many rented ones.

daft batty

ours is rented, apparently is the norm. most canadians dont see why i was concerned about it, and it seems to be no problem.

dbd33

I've only ever had rented tanks. I don't think I'd conciously decide to rent one but there's not much money involved so I leave them as they are.

Rich_007

Does the man from the Pru call round weekly too

Rich.

Biiiiink

Exactly. I haven't had a rented anything since we scraped together as students and hit Radio Rentals for a washing machine

I've never heard of rented tanks until now. But they've all got them. Seems odd to spend that much on a house and then rent a little thing like that! Unless I'm missing something obvious.

I guess dbd's right, I'll have to suck it up. Couldn't be bothered to unrent it, buy one and get it installed. Still curious as to why it happens though

Steve_P

Hmmm...never heard of renting a hot water tank here in Calgary or Edmonton.

We've always owned ours.

Almost wish it had been rented we've gone through three since moving into our house in 1987, apparently had something to do with the water pressure being to high.

This was corrected last year, pressure reduction device installed.

Cheers
Steve

MB-Realtor

Its very common in Winnipeg for homes to have Rented Hot water tanks.

I guess it's because at first sight it seems a good deal, but after you've rented it for ten years the shine goes off the deal.

Many a Winnipeg Realtor has had buy their client a new hot water tank because they forgot to find out if the House they are listing had a rented tank.

When I act as a Buyers Agent its one of the first questions I ask.

Biiiiink

Is it? I guess we looked at 15-ish houses, and none had a rented tank. Sounds like we were just lucky then!

Biiiiink

Ouch

Souvenir

We've had both. The house we bought in Oakville had a rented gas one. We assumed that we were renting it from the gas company. It turned out we weren't. The letters from Union Energy addressed to "the occupier", I simply thought were meant for the previous occuiper, so I sent them back marked "deceased".

It was only when I accidentally opened the one marked "final warning" that things became clear.

I don't know why they didn't know our names. The other utilities did long before closing day.

dbd33

Propane tanks can also be rented. The big ones for a whole house, not the ones for camping or imitation barbecues. We're considering rental vs. owning one. It's the same deal as the hwt, after some many years of renting the gas company will sell it to you at a percentage of the original cost.

PMM

Hi

Interesting, never heard of renting a hot water tank in Vancouver. Our first tank lasted 22 years (gas) replaced it for $725 installed with 10 year replacement guarantee.

iaink

As usual the government of canada comes to the rescue

http://oee.nrcan.gc.ca/equipment/eng...178.cfm?attr=4

I dont like renting, you just pay for an item several times over, but in a hard water area it might be worth it...if you dont have a softener. Ive a feeling that like TVs, breakdowns used to be a lot more common than they are now.

Biiiiink

Thanks Iain. This gets worse, so the unit doesn't belong to some rental company, but to the energy supplier? So as that article says, it's a pain to swap providers then?

Can I request homeowners cancel their HWT rental before I buy? I guess I'll ask my realtor.

denmac37

Hey Biiiiiink

Rented here in Windsor, about $70 for 3mths plus good old Canadian taxes but I think you can buy them off the shelf. My sisters leaked after 13 years so I don't think they are that unreliable. I think that these storage types are so uneconomical though waste to much gas. They do have tankless water heaters here now through the monopoly, I mean Union Gas do them.
Den