Spent $275 on a swamp cooler for my place near San Mateo and honestly it saved me this June
I live in a place near San Mateo and Central with no central air, and my window unit was running my electric bill up to almost $190 a month. So in late May I dropped $275 on a used swamp cooler off Facebook Marketplace, the big metal kind you fill with a hose. Everyone warned me it would just make the house humid and do nothing, but with our dry air it actually dropped my bedroom from 88 to 74 degrees. It did burn me on one thing though, I didn't realize how much water it goes through, I'm refilling the thing twice a day now. My electric bill came in at $118 for June, so it basically paid for itself in one month. Anyone else run one of these here, and how are you dealing with the constant refills?
Oh man, hate to be that person but I'm in San Mateo too and our air is not actually dry enough for a swamp cooler to work well long term. Swamp coolers need really low humidity to cool, and we get marine layer air rolling through here most summer days, so once it gets muggy yours is gonna feel like a damp box. If it's working for you right now, great, but just know June was probably the best case for it and July might not be as kind.