The Hidden Costs of Buying a Sauna (And How to Avoid Them)

Description

Buying a sauna isn’t as simple as looking at the price tag. There are real hidden costs most people don’t see coming—electrical surprises, installation hassles, and even return fees. In this video, I walk through the most expensive mistakes I’ve seen people make (and some I’ve made myself) so you can avoid them before you swipe your card. I’ll also explain why running your sauna might be cheaper than you think, and how the lifestyle changes it leads to—like upgrading your detox or supplement routine—are actually worth it in the long run.

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Transcript

Matt, you’ve got a lot of saunas, you’ve got a lot of buying experience with them. During the time of you buying all these saunas, were there any hidden costs that popped up that you think the viewers should know about? Absolutely. I mean, I usually pick saunas that are right for my situation, so there aren’t a lot of hidden costs, but there’s kind of an art to that.

That’s why when somebody says, hey, what’s the best brand for this, or what’s the best brand for X, and everyone jumps in there on social media and you get 100 responses, oh, buy this, or oh, buy that, that’s not really taking someone’s unique needs into account at all. The number one thing is choosing something that’s appropriate for your space.

So this comes down to both the size and the electrical requirements. If you mess this up, it can be costly. If you have to hire an electrician to put in a circuit, or you can’t return that sauna because whoever you bought it from has a terrible return policy, and you have to pay a restocking fee in order to send it back, that’s a pretty big mistake that is probably the most expensive mistake that you could make when picking one of these things out.

So the number one thing when you are buying a sauna is to do your research. Make sure you understand what type of electrical supply you have in your existing space. Is it upgradable? If you needed to get a quote from an electrician, big point here, get that before you commit to the sauna so you don’t have some surprise.

I see a lot of this stuff posted on social media like, oh, I had a circuit installed for $300 or $400. Yes, some houses can do that. In other circumstances though, the power panel is on the wrong side of the house and there’s no attic access to the room that you want to place it.

Or if you have a garage that doesn’t have adequate circuits and an electrician has to conduit in a new service for that, that’s probably going to be like a $3,500 job. So I’m not discouraging you from looking into figuring out which sauna to get. I’m encouraging you to…

Hey, let’s double check these things before you commit before you buy something before you swipe that credit card So that you don’t have any of these surprises because this part is probably the most costly mistake that I see people making What about installation? I know you talked about you know Making sure their requirements are good for your house and all that stuff is good if someone can’t like you’re pretty handy So you can put these things together, but let’s say they get something complicated like that one song we put together That was just a pain to put together screws.

Yeah, I was kicking. Yeah, that’s a really good point and I think it should be its own point like you’re saying because Electrical service and electrical supply is one thing you could choose a sauna. That’s Large right and maybe you’re an elderly person So you can’t pick up the boxes or you can’t lift the pieces and bring them upstairs or in a basement or take them You know wherever you want to install them So while you don’t have to upgrade an electrical service, you don’t have that expense Maybe there is an expense that you should allocate Toward having handyman or some helpers or some local college kids that want to make extra money or something, right?

If it’s gonna be a large panel sauna that two friends or family members can’t help you do We’ve got over 700 videos on YouTube a lot of its health and wellness sauna content If you search those I have some playlists where it’s called like infrared sauna assembly tutorials or guides if you look at those Usually there’s a threshold like a one to two person maybe a two and a half to three I can put most of those together By myself except for connecting the left and right back walls I need somebody to help me establish that corner on these so that the sauna walls will stand up by themselves Because without that there’s no stability and I also need somebody to help me put the roof on on the larger saunas Because they’re too they’re too wide For me to stretch my wingspan and kind of like support the roof until it slips down over to the walls So I would encourage you to watch some of those installation videos Some saunas are a lot more complicated to put together than others, but it’ll give you a

really good idea of what’s involved and then you kind of know if you have a three or four person sauna that you’re going to purchase and you’re an elderly person or you’re not physically able you’re probably going to need some help so ask around see what a handyman would charge to install it for you and then add that to your tab besides the cost of installation besides the cost of you know hidden things that could happen with electrical requirements i think that a hidden cost that i’ve seen in you that is exampled over here is the health and wellness supplies have increased since you started doing saunas i could see how you would say that yeah it definitely lends itself to you bringing more awareness to lifestyle health and wellness but i would argue that that’s actually a good thing because even if you spend a little bit more money by bringing awareness to these key areas you are thwarting off disease you’re increasing longevity you’re actually improving your quality of life so even if your pocketbook is a little bit lighter there’s a lot more life in those years right that makes a huge huge difference for you your family anyone that’s associated with you in your life that interacts with you because when you’re better everything else is better i get that there’s a cost to install there’s a cost for electrical requirements if you need that there’s a you know there’s a cost and increased awareness about your health and well-being well what about like when you install it you’re running it how much is that costing that’s got to be expensive right man that’s probably the cheapest part you know some people really are worried i don’t live in california i live in florida most of the year and um i’ve got a video from four or five years ago on youtube i think it’s titled infrared saunas cost to run where i hook up a three-person sauna to a kilowatt meter for a lady that has an off-grid house and she was running on solar batteries and they wanted to figure out if they could power this thing this video actually became really useful for everyone that lives in california that’s worried about power usage because you can see the kilowatt draw per hour and then you go and google your local power rate

and then you multiply the two and you get a number, right? I’ve got to tell you though, I think running these is the cheapest part. I think it costs me about $12 to $15 a month to run various saunas. I really don’t notice it.

And I’m running a lot of different saunas a lot of the time. It depends on which place you’re talking about, which office, which this, which that, but I’m only one guy, right? Even if we have people coming and doing demos, I don’t notice a huge over-consumption of power by having these things.

But compared to all the points, in my mind, the cost to actually run it electricity-wise is like the cheapest part. It’s way more expensive to buy. And I think I’d have to do the math on a calculator, but I mean, if it’s 12 bucks a month, 15 bucks, even if it’s 20 or $30 a month, how much is that a session?

I think it’s less than a dollar. So I think, you know, electrical consumption from running a sauna far, far, far gives you more health benefit than it costing, you know, a dollar or two each time you run it. And that would probably bring me to our final point that we should drive home.

You know, how do you compare, obviously the cost to buy these things, the cost to set them up, the electrical service, the, you know, whatever it costs each month to run them. But if you think five to 10 years from now, having heat therapy in your life, look at the studies, look at the benefits that people are getting, look at the way they’re able to detoxify themselves.

There’s really no comparison. I mean, if you’re looking at trading a few thousand dollars for increased longevity, better health, more time with your family, being a more effective human, I don’t know how you really put a price on that.