Save $$$ - Heat with Wood

[LD1]

That $160 is INCOME, and the government takes a percentage of it from people who give an honest accounting. So you would not have the full $160 to spend on other fuels after Uncle Sam takes his cut. Whether you actually declare and pay taxes on that income is up to you and your own set of personal ethics. Odds are the government won't ever know, but again, up to you.

I have already addressed this.

If you do "honest" accounting, and write off expenses (expenses that you cannot write off if you burn and not sell)....it's a wash.

 

[LD1]

LD1 as another homeowner with geo you've gone an ruined it for me. I'm now looking at about 5 cords of wood and feeling guilty about using it instead of selling it. Not really but I never really looked at the wood pile from your prospective, just as free heat. I still plan on burning it though. I've got a 16" stainless flue that runs 32ft high and about 26ft of stonework for the fireplace. It was obviously never put in to "save" us money but simply for our enjoyment. The whole family begs for me to get the fire going during the winter if I haven't already.

Another great reason to burn wood. Personal enjoyment. Yes it's nice to have a nice fire place with a fire roaring.

Just don't fool yourself thinking it's a big money saver.
.I have no issues burning wood. Just have issue with people claiming it's soooo much cheaper (because the wood is "free"), but in reality, it's not

 

[s219]

You clearly missed the point of my post.

I agree -- LD1, take a look again at what TnAndy wrote, it makes a good point.

 

[goeduck]

I think they are rationalizing the same basic point in totally different ways.

 

[LD1]

I agree -- LD1, take a look again at what TnAndy wrote, it makes a good point.

Went back and read everything again. Still fail to see how taxes come into play.

I am simply saying.....How much heat can you buy, if you were to sell the wood and purchase another form of heat. Thats it. No taxes.

For may, yes, firewood is still probably the cheapest.

The whole point of posting is to try to get people to realize that wood has value. Too many people look at all the "free" wood they cut and think they are saving a boat load of money with all their "free" heat.

I used to think the same way. Grew up in an old farm house and fed it 7-10 cord of wood every winter. And hey, that wood cost us nothing more than the time it takes to cut and split it.

And while thats true....., Whats also true is that I could have sold that wood for $1500. So the question is, how much would it cost to heat the same house on propane? $2000 maybe??

So rather than look at burning wood as saving you $2000 a year......You are really only saving $500.

 

[TnAndy]

Then what's your beef with me?

I don't have a beef with you. You're the one that waded in, confusing what I said with selling wood and the resulting tax/no-tax issues from the sale of wood, then saying my statements on taxes were baloney.

Anytime I can produce a head of broccoli, or a cord of firewood, or fix my washing machine, from my own place and use it myself, I consider the fact that buying any of that, I have to add a tax implication that I would have paid buying it, that for me, ends up adding about 35-40% to the so-called cost of the item WHEN DOING APPLES TO APPLES comparison.

Wood still may not work out cheaper....one has to factor in the cost to produce it ( tractor use, chainsaw, splitter, etc) versus buying it even with after-tax dollars.....but using after-tax dollars IS a consideration. That is the point I was making.

Think of it what you may.

 

[TnAndy]

Went back and read everything again. Still fail to see how taxes come into play.

I am simply saying.....How much heat can you buy, if you were to sell the wood and purchase another form of heat. Thats it. No taxes.

For may, yes, firewood is still probably the cheapest.

The whole point of posting is to try to get people to realize that wood has value. Too many people look at all the "free" wood they cut and think they are saving a boat load of money with all their "free" heat.

I used to think the same way. Grew up in an old farm house and fed it 7-10 cord of wood every winter. And hey, that wood cost us nothing more than the time it takes to cut and split it.

And while thats true....., Whats also true is that I could have sold that wood for $1500. So the question is, how much would it cost to heat the same house on propane? $2000 maybe??

So rather than look at burning wood as saving you $2000 a year......You are really only saving $500.

OK....you put the work + the cost of the tractor/saw/splitter into selling your wood for $1500......(forget the taxes for the moment)...then spent an additional $500 to buy propane.

1. WHY would you do that.....spend 500 more than you have to ?

2. WHERE did the other 500 come from ? Your job where you do actually pay taxes ? Maybe you beat the tax man on all your income......good for you.....I'm not that lucky.

If so, you had to EARN 500 plus federal income tax plus state income tax (if that applies) plus social security taxes plus you may have paid sales tax on the propane (varies state to state).

SO was it $500, or was it (in my case) more like 500 + 35%, or $675 ?

 

[Egon]

I said nothing about selling wood, nor whether anyone pays taxes on the sale.

What I said was when BUYING anything you can produce yourself, you have to factor in the cost of taxes on the equation. As I said, I have to factor in about 35% federal taxes + sales tax if I buy fuels. That makes my home produced, and used, fuel, or food, or whatever, significantly less expensive.

You can believe it or not.....

Gross income. --- net income.

Makes perfect sense.

 

[LD1]

OK....you put the work + the cost of the tractor/saw/splitter into selling your wood for $1500......(forget the taxes for the moment)...then spent an additional $500 to buy propane.

1. WHY would you do that.....spend 500 more than you have to ?

It has been explained many times though out this thread.
1. Cheaper insurance.
2. No danger from fire/smoke in the house.
3. More even/balanced heat instead of a hot spot in the room with the wood burner.
4. Dont have to worry about the fire going out in the middle of the night, or when away 14hrs a day for work
5. No chimney to worry about or clean
6. No mess in the house. Dust, bark, ashes, bugs, etc
7. I am sure there are a few other good reasons to not want to burn wood, But I'll stop here for now

2. WHERE did the other 500 come from ? Your job where you do actually pay taxes ? Maybe you beat the tax man on all your income......good for you.....I'm not that lucky.

Maybe. Maybe it came from my day job? Maybe I sold 13 cord of wood instead of 10? Maybe I inherited it? Maybe I found it laying on the ground.
Does it really matter. If Im holding $2000 in my hands, and $500 came from day job, and $1500 came from selling firewood, you are implying that the $500 is somehow different? That it somehow cost me more to acquire and that it should somehow be worth more. I dont view my money like that.

Like I said, you are making this way to technical/complicated. Taxes/no taxes/ figure it however you want.

Again, all I am simply saying is that wood (even if you cut it on your property for free) HAS VALUE.

Figure the VALUE of the wood you burn in a season. Compare THAT to other sources of heat. If you have good electric rates and geothermal or an efficient heat pump.....wood is probably costing you more money.

I cant figure this out for everyone. They have to figure it themselves. Because pricing is different everywhere. I enjoy cutting and splitting wood. But dont burn any. I heat my house for LESS money than the value of the wood I would have to burn.

I heat my house for $600 paid to the power company.
It would require 5-6 cord of wood a year to do the same. Which I sell for $800-$900
So according to my math, I am saving money, and still enjoying cutting. Win Win for me.

According to your math though, Buying my heat for $600 is actually costing me another 35%...or $810
And the value of my wood I sell is 35% less. Or ~$500-600

So by your logic it would seem wood is the cheaper heat source. And it just isnt

 

[Egon]

Most folks have income tax deducted from their pay checks. And they buy stuff with the after tax dollars.

So if they do something on their own they do not have to make more money than the product is worth.

 

[FTG-05]

LD1 earlier in this thread, I think you stated you cut, split and sell 30 cords of firewood per year (whatever the number, not gonna look for it, irrelevant to the question).

Which is: Where do you get the wood. If you get it fromn your own land, do you figure in the cost (or loss of income) for the sale of the standing timber?

 

[LD1]

LD1 earlier in this thread, I think you stated you cut, split and sell 30 cords of firewood per year (whatever the number, not gonna look for it, irrelevant to the question).

Which is: Where do you get the wood. If you get it fromn your own land, do you figure in the cost (or loss of income) for the sale of the standing timber?

Get wood from many sources. Not on my land, rather on neighboring properties. I have several locations to cut all within tractoring distance.

Alot of wood comes from fallen ash trees. The EAB has decimated ash trees in our area. And they are constantly coming down.

Some wood comes from tops. What is left behind when a logger harvest's a woods.

Some of it comes from clearing out fence rows. And fence row trees have no value to any mill that I am aware of.

Some of it comes from storm damage cleanup.

Some comes from tree trimmers clearing power line ROW's.

So there is no loss of income. The wood I cut is only good for firewood and nothing more. And if I do not cut it, it will either rot (in the case of the fallen trees in the woods, or tops left by loggers). OR someone else will cut it in the case of tree trimmers work, or if a farmer is wanting a fence row cleared.

 

[4570Man]

I get most of my wood from tree guys. I've cut about 35 cords this year and I haven't cut a tree on my place that didn't need cut anyway.

 

[IXLR8]

My home came with electric baseboard heat. I had an old wood stove, Vermont Castings Defiant Encore, that I installed in the existing chimney. I was spending about $300 a month for electric heat, I now spend about $300 per season to heat with wood. Wood is cheaper for me, also my wife and I both love the feel of the radiant heat from the wood stove.

 

[LD1]

My home came with electric baseboard heat. I had an old wood stove, Vermont Castings Defiant Encore, that I installed in the existing chimney. I was spending about $300 a month for electric heat, I now spend about $300 per season to heat with wood. Wood is cheaper for me, also my wife and I both love the feel of the radiant heat from the wood stove.

That was my same scenario.

House had baseboard. Expensive.

Got through two winter's with wood. But did nothing for ac.

The cost of JUST and AC system was not much savings over a heat pump or geothermal.

So I chose Geo so I can heat AND cool with it.

I can now heat cheaper with Geo than I could with wood.

Sure it's a big upfront cost. And that certainly factors. But for me, I was looking at a big cost anyway wanting air conditioning.

 

[dodge man]

LD1, I'm sorry, I just don't buy into your theory that you have to factor in what the wood is worth if you sold it. I understand what you are saying and yes, it does have value. If I looked at things that way half the stuff I do in life wouldn't make finacial sense and I'd probably wouldn't have any fun.

 

[jk96]

LD1, I'm sorry, I just don't buy into your theory that you have to factor in what the wood is worth if you sold it. I understand what you are saying and yes, it does have value. If I looked at things that way half the stuff I do in life wouldn't make finacial sense and I'd probably wouldn't have any fun.

I agree DM. You have to realize that most of us would never split wood in the first place just for resale. We either use it or don't split it. Given that our bill either stays the same if we don't use wood or goes down if we supplement with wood heat. It is not costing us anything other than maybe the tools we use to get it to the wood pile.

 

[Snobdds]

Wood heat is radiant heat. It heats the objects in the room, including humans. It's a heat that takes longer to heat soak everything, but when it does, that heat is hard to loose. Heat pumps, forced air furnace, etc are convection heat. They heat the air in the room...you will never get a heat sink using convection heat. That is why radiant heat is such a warming heat. I don't care if it's not the most economical, I put a higher value on radiant heat over convection heat, and because of that I will always have a wood stove going.

 

[LD1]

LD1, I'm sorry, I just don't buy into your theory that you have to factor in what the wood is worth if you sold it. I understand what you are saying and yes, it does have value. If I looked at things that way half the stuff I do in life wouldn't make finacial sense and I'd probably wouldn't have any fun.

Its not a theory.

Its a fact that the wood you are burning has actual cash value if you would choose to sell it.

I understand that burning wood is indeed a money saver for alot of people. The debate here is just "how much" is saved.

Lets oversimplify. Lets say there are three of us. We are all neighbors. Have exact same houses and exact same heating demands. We are Dodge-man, JK96, and LD1.

JK96 chooses just to buy heat. (propane, Nat-gas, electric, heat pump....pick your flavor). He handles NO wood, and dont want to. He spends $300/month for 6 months out of the year to stay warm. $1800 total

Dodge-man choose to cut, split, and burn 10 cord of wood to heat his house. He assumes this is low cost heat cause he only has the cost of running the equipment. A few gallons of saw and splitter gas, some equipment upkeep, etc. Maybe $200/year worth. He feels he is saving $1600 per year, and getting free exercise and enjoys cutting wood.

LD1 also enjoys cutting wood. But doesnt like the mess in the house, and the hassle of keeping a fire going. So like Dodge-man he also cuts 10 cord a year. But rather than burn that wood, He chooses to sell it for $160/cord. Still has the ~$200/year in running the equipment. He takes the remaining $1400, puts another $400 with it and buys heat just as JK96 does. Yes he is spending more than dodge-man to heat his house, but its worth it to him not to have to deal with the fire and mess in the house.

So is Dodge-man really saving $1600 a year when compared to LD1?

 

[turnkey4099]

I've got a guy that helps me split wood just for the exercise and won't take any money.

Sounds like me. I am clear cutting a half mile row of huge, old, dying willows at no charge to the farmer. When I started I suggested he couild kick in a bit of gas moneiy (17 miles from my house) occasionally. He did give me a $100 the second year, none since. I'm 82 and if it weren't for the 'wooding' I'd probably be dead or bedreidden by now. Just came in from manually splitting on my woodpile for 1.5 hours.

I hate winter as I don't get the exercise I am used to.