r/TexasEnergyShopping

Monthly usage is over 2,000kWh. Average 2,300kWh with the high and low months, every month is over 2k.

I’ve been searching powertochoose for a bit before the earliest signup date and saw this rate. 12.3cents per kWh for 2,000kWh. Early termination fee of $150. I signed up for it.

Since then, I seen it dropped to about 12cents through 12.1cents for the same plan, then it suddenly vanished. I’m looking at similar 36 month plans and there were some comparable to it but the early termination fee was over $300.

I think I did pretty good, with the low early termination fee so if rate drops significantly, it’ll be easier to change plans without having the rate need to drop too much to the ETF worth it. I have it planned to start shopping around April for my plans, which is usually the lowest rate next to September/October.

I think I scored on this rate, especially at 36 months fix rate non time of usage. This is in the Houston market.

There are a few electricity providers in the Texas deregulated market that exist with this business model:

• Step #1: Acquire as many customers as they can at a loss - meaning the rates they offer are so low compared to the cost of wholesale power, they make no money from your bills
• Step #2: Sell your account, along with thousands of others, to a bigger, more expensive provider

Why this matters:

• You get a low rate from the first provider.
• Then you get sold off.
• Then, it's very likely your renewal offer from the bigger provider will be a significant increase from your previous rate.
• There may be fees with the new provider if you don't set up autopay or e-billing.
• You can switch within 14 days of the sale.

If you're okay with constantly switching providers every year, that's fine. The bigger provider is required to honor your rate until the end of the original contract. You can just switch before you renew with them.

If you'd rather stick with a provider that will treat you right, these are the providers to avoid:

• Budget Power
  • r/ Houston thread about Budget selling off to Direct (owned by NRG aka Reliant)
  • Texas Electricity Finder 2-star review of Budget that calls out you will be sold
• True Power LLC
  • Energy Choice Matters article about past sale to NRG
  • KPRC Houston story by Amy Davis about providers selling customers
    • True Power sold to Direct Energy (NRG)
    • True Power sold to SFE Energy

If you've ever been sold to another provider, share your story!

I just went through the full Power to Choose export for north Texas and compared every plan mathematically against my actual 12 months of usage history. Figured I'd share since this question comes up constantly here.

The short version: After adjusting for hidden fees and real-world usage levels, Energy Texas No Bull 12 is the best value 12-month fixed plan I found for most north Texas households. Their current rate works out to about 12.7¢/kWh at 1,000 kWh — the current north Texas market average across all providers is 15.38¢. That's a meaningful difference on every single bill.

What I looked at and ruled out:

The "bundle" plans from Tara Energy, Amigo, and Just Energy (Sustainable Home Bundle, Sustainable Lifestyle, etc.) look cheapest on Power to Choose but hide a mandatory $49.99 GoodBundle setup fee inside the averaged rate. Add that back and they're worse than Energy Texas.

Min-usage credit plans like "Texas Two-K" that offer bill credits for using 2,000+ kWh/month are a trap unless you're actually hitting that threshold. Most households don't, so the credit is effectively phantom pricing.

Free nights plans (Chariot Bright Nights) only beat a flat rate if you can shift 45%+ of your usage to the 11pm–6am window. For a typical household without an EV that's not realistic.

Smart thermostat situation: if you have a Nest, there's not much in this market for you right now — Octopus has a $25 one-time Rush Hour Rewards credit and that's about it. If you have or are planning to get an Amazon or Honeywell smart thermostat though, Energy Texas gives you $5 off your bill every single month just for having it connected. That's $60/year on top of an already competitive rate, and it stacks with the autopay and paperless credits already baked into the plan price.

With LNG markets still tight from the Iran conflict and ERCOT demand growing fast from data centers and industrial load, locking in a rate now at 12.7¢ looks a lot smarter than waiting and hoping rates stay flat. The industry forecast is rates up roughly 29% by 2030.

Disclosure: Energy Texas has a refer-a-friend program — we both get $100 bill credit. If this was useful and you want to use my link: https://energytexas.com/raf?referralCode=Y75sd5SIfF

No pressure at all. The plan info stands regardless, just being upfront about it.

“Moving into a 990 sqft apartment in Carrollton (Oncor area). Just me and my spouse. Looking for honest fixed-rate electricity providers without gimmicky bill credits or hidden fees. Considering Gexa, Octopus, TXU, and 4Change.

Update: I decided to go with Energy Texas fixed rate plan. Here is the link $100 discount on your bill which will appear after 60 days, the code is if you want to give to customer support guy : Pc9sL6LXqb

https://energytexas.com/raf?referralCode=Pc9sL6LXqb&utm_source=raf&utm_medium=my-account