https://cleantechnica.com/2018/03/26/will-renters-charge-evs/
So what will you do if one of your apartment renters buys an EV and ask to install a charging station?
I heard the smartvisors are going to propose landlords provide one per apartment. 
Well, I would hope a tenant like that would be smart enough to ask before buying the EV. There may not be enough room or an appropriate spot for a charging station there. Not sure a tenant is going to be willing to foot the bill for the installation of a charging station when he/she may not even be there for long.
Are you kidding me? The solar guys, and I know many stories about it, never asked if you were going to buy an EV, how about 2? Guess what happened? Their for free solar energy wasn’t enough for the money they paid for those panels.
Well, my new home will need a new roof and skylights anyway so I plan to get a solar panel quote that comes with battery pack. If I can store the electricity for home use and say an EV I might consider it.
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A good suggestion if you want to hear it. Make sure that you get a company that checks your insulation on doors, windows, and attic if any. The proper measurements are about 15-16" of insulation. No cracks, no holes between attic/roof and ceilings.
Doors and windows (preferable new) need to be sealed. HVAC new or at least not that old. Battery is the clue here, since I believe this is the thing that will innovate the solar industry. Without a battery to hold the excess energy, I don’t see that much of an advantage since PG&E, if it allows you to sell your excess energy, won’t pay you but pennies when you are paying $0.16 <> x Kw.
If you don’t take care of the above, it is like having a car with a hole in the tank.
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No worries, I am going to spoil this house with goodies like I did with my Sunset home (full insulation, earthquake proofing, smooth walls, tankless water, casement windows, wired home networking, theater living room and piped in music to every room of the house). The house already has radiant heated flooring so that is going to be sweet…
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A tip if you care for it - get some nests for your radiant floors. My radiant floors - six zones - were practically unmanageable because of the multi-hour response time. If i upped the thermostat, it would take hours until I felt anything, and that time delta itself was inconsistent based on varying outside temps. Once I got the nests, I just set the nest to a manually programmed temp … but the nests learn the “responsiveness” of the radiant system and automatically fires up n mins/hrs before the time you programmed in. So awesome.
Btw - solar - how big of a system do you plan to get? We have a 6.9 kw system - we are grandfathered into PGE’s TOU rates and we typically get a $200 check every year from PGE.
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Thanks, appreciate the tip. And these are “nests”? The seller put in the radiant heated flooring, so I am going to have to learn how to use it. He says it works beautifully and is not expensive. Maybe you can confirm.
Not sure how big of a solar panel system is needed. The main house is 3/2 and the inlaw is a 1/1 unit. Who did you go with for the solar panels?
Yes - Nest thermostat - one per zone. They really finish off a radiant system.
Btw -it is possible, since you have hydronic radiant heat, that you actually have a separate boiler and water tank - and that tank may both heat your house and serve your house’s domestic hot water needs. If that is the case you may find that a tankless water heater is not necessary. Those boilers are typically super powerful - much moreso than the ones that come with built in water heaters.
We used sunpower panels from a local dealer - both luminalt and occidental are good. We have 30 panels on the roof - 4/3.5 house and back when all our lighting was halogen cans, we still overproduced. Since then we’ve switched 60 pc of the cans to LED so we get a bit more back from PGE.
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Oh, of course, Nest thermostats (duh). Yeah, he said the radiant heating is sort of a byproduct from the heating of the water. I didn’t get it until he explained that was why the house didn’t have a separate form of forced air heating system. I imagine San Bruno is not too cold and with the proper insulating (thanks @buyinghouse) we should be nice and snug with the warm, heated flooring.
One issue I see from the massive family room is that the gas fireplace is dead center on one side of the room where there is no room for a massive 85" tv. I would need to put it on the opposite side of the room, so not sure how to position a sectional sofa or a double sided couch there so that the room looks symmetrical and even.
And the funny thing is, my Director just told me when we move we will more than likely be allowed to work from home more. Dang, maybe I don’t need the house after all…
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If self driving and Uber is the future. Apartment dwellers won’t even have cars.
I think that is popular sentiment but perhaps the future will be more complex than that.
First of all, the time scale for autonomous driving is way off — it won’t be tomorrow or next week. For autonomous driving to really work, everything on the road really needs to be autonomous -and- have complete coordination. Just look at how easy it is right now for human drivers to game the autonomous chevy bolts that are running around in SF right now.
Second, if you accept that autonomous cars will be fleet run, then the issue of fleet management and cleanliness come up. Humans, especially Americans, are dirty. Look how many hundreds of millions Hertz/National/Avis/etc spend to clean their fleet rental cars after every rental. Look how dirty public transit is.
People will seek to find a bit of luxury above fleet run transportation — whether for cleanliness or for prestige — and that will be private ownership then of autonomous cars.
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People looking for luxury and prestige won’t be living in apartments
Humans will always want to feel that they stand out among their peers. Even people who live in section 8 want the latest iPhone!
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Average new car today costs $32k, $525/m plus gas insurance maintenance tolls parking. None of my tenants can afford a new car
Your tenants probably fit a different profile than my tenants. My tenants have Toyota, BMW, Audi, Prius, Alfa, Mustang, etc.
Do they live in apartments or sfhs?