If you operate an RV park in Texas and use smart sub-metering, you may be sitting on a major cost-saving opportunity.

According to Texas law (Administrative Code § 3.295), electricity used by long-term tenants — those staying over 30 consecutive days — is exempt from sales tax if they consume over 50% of the electricity measured through a single utility account. This is known as the predominant use exemption.

Wild Energy parks have now surpassed $10 million in recovered utility costs and that number is climbing fast— currently at a rate of more than $18,000 per day.

On average, each park has recaptured over $45,000, simply by implementing metering systems that turn unknown usage into actionable data.

With electric bills regularly approaching $100,000 per year, it’s easy to see how quickly that adds up, especially when utility costs go untracked or unbilled.

Whether you’re still doing manual reads or just starting to think about short-stay electricity recovery, here’s a quick breakdown of how smart utility metering is being used by real parks using Campspot to save time, reduce errors, and increase control.

In this roundtable webinar, Lee Brady, owner of Red Coach Resort, shares how he’s using Wild Energy and ResNexus to take control of utility costs, eliminate manual meter reading, and streamline billing. His firsthand experience offers valuable insight for any park owner looking to stay profitable in a changing market.

The Wild Energy Owner’s Portal gives park operators real-time visibility into electricity usage, billing, and meter status—all in one place. With automated reports, check-in/check-out tracking, and data exports, it’s never been easier to manage utilities and maximize revenue.

Wild Energy celebrates a major milestone—10 powerful utility metering integrations that are transforming outdoor hospitality.

Switching from old utility-owned sub meters to smart meters gives property owners more control, saves money, and makes billing easier. But it’s not always simple—rules, setup challenges, and utility company pushback can make it tricky. Requesting your utility to switch your property to Master Metering can help.

Wild Energy President and CEO, Mike Sorensen, joined Campspot Senior Product Manager, Lesley Sablatura, to talk about utility management challenges including rising rates and high electric demand.

They also shared strategies for effective utility management and use cases for the integration between Campspot and Wild Energy.

Watch the webinar here

This case study explores how a Wild Energy campground customer leveraged smart metering technology to implement a short stay utility metering charge-back strategy, transforming an often-overlooked cost into a significant revenue stream. By integrating smart metering into their rate management system, the campground optimized their billing processes, recaptured utility costs from transient guests, and established a new profit center to offset the administrative and infrastructure burdens associated with energy usage.

This case study highlights the significant impact of Wild Energy's smart metering system on a prominent RV park and campground, leading to a 25% reduction in energy costs, enhanced operational efficiency, and the ability to accurately bill short-term guests for their energy usage. This comprehensive transformation showcases the value of smart metering in improving both operational management and guest satisfaction.

In the pursuit of cost savings, many businesses are tempted by low-cost metering solutions, such as options like clamp-on Current Transformer (CT) meters that are available from metering companies and on retail platforms like Amazon. While these alternatives may seem like good financial decisions at first glance when compared to commercial meters, they often carry hidden pitfalls that can lead to significant long-term costs, operational headaches, and compliance risks.

Investing in automated smart metering technology provides one of the best returns on investment (ROI) for any size campground or RV resort. It’s not just about upgrading to the latest technology—it’s about making a smart financial decision that pays off in multiple ways.

In this video, we showcase how a bustling Florida campground successfully upgraded 250 electric meters in just two days during peak snowbird season!

We'll take you through the process of replacing old analog meters with advanced smart meters from Wild Energy. Watch as the park maintenance staff swiftly and safely upgrade each meter, minimizing disruptions and enhancing operational efficiency instantly.

With technology now existing to automate meter reading parks can charge every guest for exactly what they used. At Wild Energy we like to refer to this as Fair for All instead of being free and unregulated. With that in mind I wanted to hear from campers about what they thought about billing for electricity.

In years past, we’ll admit that we often recommended disconnecting meters to customers. After all, it seemed a great option.  When the site was vacant, you could turn off the power.  Mr. Johnson in the site next door couldn’t run his extension cord over to the empty site. However, after talking to customers and through real world data analysis, the team at Wild Energy has come to the realization that disconnecting meters may not be the right solution in 99% of cases.