Texas Property Manager Electricity: Compare Multi-Unit Rates

Property managers in Texas do not shop for electricity the way a single homeowner does. You may be juggling vacant units, common-area meters, tenant move-ins, and—depending on how the building is wired—either dozens of residential accounts or one commercial-sized master bill. Getting the comparison right starts with knowing which meters you control, which market rules apply at each address, and how to read a price that already includes non-negotiable delivery charges.

This guide walks through deregulated versus regulated Texas service areas, metering setups that change who can shop, how energy and wires charges stack on a bill, and a practical method for comparing multi-unit rates without getting fooled by teaser pricing.

Why Multi-Unit Shopping Is Different for Property Managers

A household comparing plans usually cares about one meter and one usage pattern. A property manager is often managing a portfolio of meters with uneven load: empty units with HVAC setbacks, clubhouse and corridor lighting that run every night, laundry rooms with spiky demand, and leased spaces where tenants hold their own accounts. Industry-facing comparison platforms treat property management and multi-family assets as distinct commercial use cases precisely because common-area systems and aggregate demand look nothing like a typical residence (¹).

That operational reality changes what “a good rate” means. A rock-bottom residential teaser that looks cheap at 500 kilowatt-hours (kWh) can be a poor fit for a leasing office that uses 2,000 kWh in August. A commercial fixed quote that looks high on paper may still beat a stack of month-to-month residential plans once you factor in staff time, vacancy churn, and early-termination risk across fifty ESI IDs (the Electric Service Identifier that labels each meter in Texas).

Scale also changes the shopping channel. ²—the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) official shopping site—is built for residential-style comparison in competitive areas. Larger or non-residential loads often move into commercial procurement with retail electric providers (REPs) that serve small, medium, or large commercial customers, a list the Power to Choose site maintains separately (³).

Deregulated Versus Regulated Texas: Confirm You Can Shop

Not every Texas ZIP code lets you pick a REP. Retail competition in Texas grew out of Senate Bill 7 in 1999, which separated generation, delivery, and retail sales for investor-owned utilities and tasked the PUCT with implementing customer choice (⁴). ERCOT estimates that roughly 85% of Texas electricity consumers can choose a retail provider, including major metros such as Dallas–Fort Worth, Houston, Corpus Christi, Galveston, and Waco (⁴).

The remaining customers sit in Non-Opt-In Entity (NOIE) areas—most municipally owned utilities and electric cooperatives—where residents and businesses generally cannot switch providers. ERCOT specifically notes that NOIE areas include places such as Austin and San Antonio and many smaller communities, with only limited opt-ins historically (⁴).

If you manage property inside the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) competitive footprint and you are not served by a co-op or municipal utility, the PUCT says you can choose your electric provider and use Power to Choose to compare plans (⁵). If the same portfolio includes an Austin Energy or co-op address, that meter is a regulated, utility-set rate problem—not a REP shopping problem. Austin Energy, for example, publishes a multi-tier residential rate schedule with a fixed customer charge and rising per-kWh energy charges by usage tier, plus power-supply and regulatory line items (⁶). Comparing that bill to a Houston deregulated offer is still useful for budgeting across a portfolio, but it is not an apples-to-apples “switch to Plan X” decision.

Benchmarking helps set expectations before you solicit quotes. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reports that Texas’s average retail price across all sectors was 9.79 cents per kWh in 2024, ranking 42nd among states—relatively inexpensive on a statewide blended basis (⁷). More recent monthly data show Texas residential averages of 16.44 cents per kWh in May 2026 (versus 15.53 cents in May 2025) and commercial averages of 8.26 cents per kWh in May 2026 (versus 8.62 cents a year earlier) (⁸). Those averages mix competitive and regulated territories and all plan types; your property’s locked fixed rate can sit well above or below the mean.

Metering Setups That Decide Who Shops—and Who Pays

Before you compare rates, map the metering. In Texas multi-unit housing, three patterns dominate.

Individually metered units. Each dwelling has its own utility meter and ESI ID. Tenants (or the owner, during vacancy) choose a REP in competitive areas. The property’s shopping problem is mostly vacant-unit coverage, move-in timing, and common-area accounts.

Submetering. The complex takes service through a master arrangement, and management reads unit-level submeters. The PUCT explains that many apartment, condo, and mobile-home residents have meters read by complex management rather than by the electric company (⁹). Under PUCT guidance, submetered bills are built by dividing the complex’s net electric charges (plus applicable tax) by total kWh to get an average cost per kWh, then multiplying that average by each tenant’s submetered use (⁹). Electric charges must be billed separately from rent, late fees are capped, and tenants can review master bills and submeter records (⁹). Substantive Rule §25.142 defines master meters and sets detailed owner obligations for apartments, condominiums, and mobile home parks (¹⁰; ¹¹).

Non-submetered (central system) master metering. Residents lack unit meters and pay a share of the complex bill—often based on unit square footage as a percentage of total living area and conditioned common space, with that percentage stated in the lease (⁹). The complex is the utility customer; individual tenants generally do not shop for their own REP under that arrangement.

Master-metered properties also carry disconnection-notice rules. When a master-metered apartment bill is delinquent, providers must warn tenants with conspicuous posted notices before cutting service (¹²). That is a compliance and resident-relations risk, not just a rate issue.

For managers, the shopping implication is blunt: if tenants hold individual ESI IDs, you compare residential plans (or vacancy products) meter by meter. If you hold a master commercial account, you compare commercial offers against your interval or monthly load shape. Mixing those playbooks is how portfolios overpay.

How Texas Bills Are Built: Energy Price Plus Wires Charges

In competitive areas, the company that sells you power is not the company that owns the poles and meters. REPs market electricity and bill customers; transmission and distribution service providers (TDSPs or TDUs) maintain lines and meters (¹³). Oncor, a major Texas TDU, states that it does not generate power or bill residential customers directly; it charges the customer’s REP for delivery, and the REP passes those costs through on the retail bill as delivery, wires, or transmission-and-distribution charges (¹⁴).

Delivery charges typically combine a fixed monthly component and usage-based charges set in PUCT-approved tariffs (¹³). Oncor has described residential delivery as including a fixed monthly amount plus roughly five cents per kWh of delivered energy—figures that illustrate structure, even as tariffs are revised over time (¹⁴). Houston-area CenterPoint Energy publishes a full Tariff for Retail Delivery Service with residential and secondary (non-residential) rate schedules used to bill competitive retailers (¹⁵).

Why this matters for multi-unit comparison: two REPs quoting the same “energy” number can still produce nearly identical total bills if delivery dominates, and two properties with identical REP rates can diverge because Oncor and CenterPoint tariffs differ. Always compare the total average price on the Electricity Facts Label (EFL) at the usage level that matches each meter—not the marketing headline alone.

Comparing Multi-Unit Rates Without Mixing Apples and Oranges

Start with a meter inventory: ESI ID, service address, TDU territory, whether the account is residential or commercial, whether it is occupied or vacant, and twelve months of kWh (plus demand data if the meter is demand-billed). Without usage, shopping is guesswork.

For individually metered residential-style accounts in competitive areas, use ² by ZIP code, then open each plan’s EFL. The PUCT designed the EFL as an “apples-to-apples” disclosure of prices and contract terms, analogous to a nutrition label (¹⁶). Commission rules require EFLs to state whether a product is fixed or variable and to disclose pricing in a standardized format that includes average prices at representative monthly usage levels such as 500, 1,000, and 2,000 kWh (¹⁷).

Practical comparison rules for managers:

1. Match the usage column to the meter. A vacant one-bedroom in shoulder season is not a 2,000 kWh comparison. A third-floor west-facing unit in August might be.
2. Separate base energy from bill credits. Some plans look cheap only after a conditional credit that a vacancy account will never earn.
3. Read term length and exit fees. Portfolio churn from lease turnover makes a 36-month exit fee expensive if you cannot keep the same plan on the same ESI ID through tenant changes.
4. Watch time-of-use and wholesale-indexed products. They can work for sophisticated common-area controls; they are a poor default for unsupervised vacant units.
5. Do not assume one REP fits every TDU territory. Multi-location operators routinely find that a Houston plan does not exist in Dallas because TDSP territories and provider participation differ (¹⁸).

For master-metered or high-usage common-area accounts, residential plan boards are often the wrong tool. Power to Choose’s non-residential provider directory shows which certified REPs serve small, medium, large commercial, and industrial customers (³). Commercial quotes should be scored on term, bandwidth or swing tolerances, demand charges, after-hours fees, and whether the offer is fixed, indexed, or a hybrid—using your actual load factor, not a generic “business” assumption.

Portfolio operators also choose between centralized procurement (one supplier relationship across many meters) and location-specific shopping. Centralizing can simplify billing and leverage volume; site-by-site shopping can fit mismatched load shapes across territories, at the cost of more administration (¹⁸). Staggering contract end dates across a portfolio reduces the risk of renewing every meter at a single market peak (¹⁸).

Worked Example: Same Teaser, Different Meters

Suppose two EFLs both advertise “11¢.” On Plan A, the average price at 500 kWh is 14.2¢ and at 2,000 kWh is 11.0¢ because a high base charge is spread over more kilowatt-hours. On Plan B, the averages are 11.4¢ at 500 kWh and 11.1¢ at 2,000 kWh. For a vacant unit that used 480 kWh last month, Plan B wins. For a continuously occupied three-bedroom that averaged 1,900 kWh last summer, the plans are nearly tied—and contract length, renewable content, and exit fees should break the tie. That is exactly why the PUCT standardized EFL usage columns instead of letting marketers pick a single vanity number (¹⁶; ¹⁷).

Common-area meters deserve their own spreadsheet tab. Lobby lighting and garage exhaust can be flatter and more predictable than dwelling units, which sometimes favors longer fixed terms. Amenity centers with pools and electric heat pumps can look like small commercial loads even when the tariff is residential. If demand charges appear once a meter crosses a TDSP threshold, ask the REP to model summer peaks explicitly using the CenterPoint or Oncor secondary-service schedules that apply to non-residential delivery (¹⁵; ¹³).

Vacancy, Continuous Service, and Move-In Timing

Vacant units are where property managers quietly lose money. Lights-out periods still incur TDU minimums and any REP base charges; aggressive “free nights” or high bill-credit plans rarely help an empty apartment. Favor simple fixed rates with transparent EFL averages at low usage, short remaining terms that align with expected lease-up, and providers that can execute fast move-in / move-out switches.

ERCOT administers retail switching so customers can change REPs without a service interruption when the process is followed; the ISO tracks millions of customer accounts and coordinates enrollments with TDSPs (⁴). Operationally, your leasing workflow should treat electricity enrollment as a gate: proof of service before keys, clear responsibility for the gap days between tenants, and a documented owner account for make-ready. The PUCT consumer line (1-888-782-8477) remains the official path for shopping questions and complaints about REP conduct (⁵).

Document the owner’s preferred vacancy product in the property’s operations manual: REP name, plan name, EFL PDF, account numbers, and the staff role allowed to authorize switches. When a leasing agent improvises a new prepaid plan every turnover, you lose the ability to benchmark costs. ERCOT’s switching framework is designed so a correctly submitted change can take effect on a scheduled date with a TDSP meter read and no physical interruption (⁴). The failures managers feel—dark units, double billing, lost deposits—usually come from late paperwork, mismatched move-in dates, or tenants who never complete enrollment, not from the grid operator’s process itself.

If the property is master-metered, vacancy economics flip: empty units still sit on the owner’s master bill, so the “rate” problem is inseparable from building efficiency and allocation rules disclosed in leases (⁹).

What About Choice States Beyond Texas?

Many operators manage assets in more than one state. Ohio and Maryland also run retail-choice frameworks for many customers, but the shopping portals, utility territories, and consumer-protection details differ from Texas’s Power to Choose system. EIA’s state price table is still a useful cross-check: in May 2026, Ohio’s residential average was 19.52¢ per kWh and Maryland’s was 21.77¢, both above Texas’s 16.44¢ residential average for the same month (⁸). Treat those figures as market context, not as a promise that your building will land on the average. When a portfolio spans Texas plus another choice state, the winning approach is usually location-specific procurement with shared reporting—not one national “rate” forced onto every meter (¹⁸).

In fully regulated U.S. markets outside choice programs, “comparing rates” means comparing tariffs, riders, and efficiency options from the incumbent utility—similar to an Austin Energy exercise—rather than soliciting REP bids. Keep that distinction clear in owner reports so asset managers do not expect a Texas-style switch where the law does not allow one (⁴; ⁶).

Efficiency: The Rate Multiplier Managers Control Year-Round

Shopping sets the price per kWh; efficiency sets how many kWh you buy. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s ENERGY STAR Multifamily New Construction program targets lower energy use in multifamily buildings while improving comfort and indoor air quality, requiring above-code performance—at least 10% savings versus the state’s energy code via ERI, ASHRAE 90.1 modeling, or prescribed features—plus mandatory measures for common-space lighting and HVAC controls (¹⁹). Even if you are not building new, the checklist items—air sealing between units, correctly sized HVAC, exterior-venting kitchen and bath fans, and controlled common-area systems—translate into lower common-area bills and fewer tenant bill complaints that land on the office.

The U.S. Department of Energy’s Zero Energy Ready Home multifamily pathway similarly emphasizes envelope, electric readiness, and alignment with ENERGY STAR multifamily processes for higher-performing buildings (²⁰). For an operating portfolio, the near-term levers are boring and effective: LED common areas on schedules or occupancy sensors, HVAC setpoint policies for vacant units, filter changes, weatherstripping on breezeway doors, and benchmarking large buildings’ energy data so outliers show up before renewal season.

In regulated cities, efficiency also interacts with tiered rates. Austin Energy’s inside-city residential structure charges progressively more per kWh as monthly use climbs through four tiers, so cutting a high-use common-area account’s consumption can drop blocks of usage into cheaper tiers (⁶).

A Decision Checklist for Comparing Multi-Unit Rates

Use this sequence when a property renews, a new asset comes under management, or summer bills spike:

1. Confirm market type for every address—competitive ERCOT choice versus municipal/co-op NOIE (⁴).
2. Classify metering—tenant ESI IDs, submetered master, or non-submetered allocation—and verify lease disclosures match PUCT rules (⁹).
3. Pull 12 months of usage (and demand, if applicable) for common-area and vacancy meters.
4. Identify the TDU and remember delivery charges ride along regardless of which REP you pick (¹³).
5. Shop the right channel—Power to Choose and EFLs for residential-style meters (²; ¹⁶); commercial REP bids for master and large common-area loads (³).
6. Score total average price at realistic kWh levels, term risk, and operational fit—not the teaser number.
7. Align vacancy and move-in SOPs with switching timelines so units are never dark longer than make-ready requires (⁴).
8. Pair the contract with efficiency work so the rate you lock is multiplied by fewer kilowatt-hours (¹⁹).

If you want a second set of eyes on commercial or multi-site quotes, licensed brokers and comparison platforms that cover property management and multi-family loads can help organize bids—without replacing your duty to read the EFL or contract (¹). Keep ownership of the decision criteria: total average price at real usage, term risk, vacancy workflow fit, and TDU territory coverage.

Texas gives many property managers a real chance to cut electric spend—but only after they stop treating a 200-unit community like a single household ZIP search. Map the meters, respect the market boundaries, compare EFLs and commercial quotes at the loads you actually run, and keep vacancy and common areas on a deliberate plan. That is how multi-unit rate shopping turns from a yearly scramble into a controllable operating expense.