Cold Water!!!

90% of the houses in Costa Rica do not have a water heater. Most houses, have a “thermos” in their showers, and will only heat the water on their shower. Since our house is only like a year old, we did want a water heater so we would be able to have hot or cold water on most of our piping system. Well, our contractor recommended a water heater tank. It was a timer, and has a capacity for 30 liters of water. It was supposed to be the best choice compare to a tankless water heater, because if the power for some reason went off, we would still have hot for 24 more hours.

Well, it was sooooo not the best choice!!! Not only is it a huge tank and it takes up too much space in the laundry room, but the tank only works fine for 4 months, and then it dies. Every four months I need to call the manufacture and book an appointment, so they can come and repair it. It takes them forever to book an appointment, and sometimes I’ve had to wait more than a week for them to come over. And when the repair guy comes in, which he can only come during weekdays during working hours, which means that either Ale or I have to ask for permission at work, they end up charging us more than $100, because their guarantee only covers visits. Seriously!!! We got this tank last December, and it stopped working for the first time on March 2009. The repair guy came in and said it was the timer. Well, it stopped working again on July. And now, last Friday I woke up to a cold shower, ‘cause our tank stopped working AGAIN!! I’m so tired of having to deal with this every four months. So instead of calling in, waiting for the repairman to come over and charge us a fortune (which it is, at least here in CR) we’ve decided to buy a tankless water heater.

It is much smaller, and though it will not heat water if there is no power; I rather not have a hot shower once in a while, than have to wait over a week every four months and be charged a ridiculous amount of money for something that I know it will have to fix in four more months.