Keep Above
Repair or replace the water heater
A water heater that's leaking, tripping or running cold puts the usual two options on the table: fix this one or fit another. Enter what the repair would cost and the extra years you'd expect from it, then a replacement with the years it would last — each side lands on a cost per year over its own life, the one figure they share. No winner is declared; the estimates are yours.
Your estimate, not the page's
Not counted while this is $0
Your estimate, not the page's
Not counted while this is $0
Comes off the replacement
Put in what the fix would cost and what a replacement would cost. Nothing here is read from your accounts, and nothing is saved.
| Repairing | Replacing | |
|---|---|---|
| Up front | — | — |
| Running costs over its life | — | — |
| Total over its life | — | — |
| How long that covers | — | — |
| Cost a year | — | — |
| Cost a month | — | — |
This is one of the tools built into Keep Above
Keep Above is a budgeting app where you enter your bills and income and it works out the balance you need to keep — so you can see what's safe to spend. No bank connection, no ads on your data.
About this calculator
What counts as the repair cost for a water heater?
The whole of the quote to have hot water again — call-out, the element, thermostat or valve that failed, and the labour to fit it. The cost per year spreads that full amount over the extra years you think the repair would buy, so a partial figure would flatter the repair side.
What goes into running costs a year here?
Where the old unit and a replacement would use noticeably different amounts of power or gas across a year, that difference belongs in the running-costs boxes. Where the two would run much the same, both boxes can stay at $0 and the comparison rests on the up-front figures.
What is the matching time?
The number of years the repair would have to carry the water heater for its cost per year to match the replacement's — a position in the arithmetic, nothing more. When running the old one already costs more each year than the whole replacement does all-up, no length of time would match, and the page says so.
What about selling or scrapping the old one?
Whatever the old unit would fetch — scrap, or a trade-in where an installer offers one — comes off the replacement's cost. For many units that is close to nothing, and at $0 the box simply does nothing.