New Jersey is in the throes of its first heat wave of the summer as a mid-summer weather pattern sends temperatures soaring. And July 4 is just a week away.
You wouldn’t be alone if you decided now is the best time to get into a pool. If you don’t have one in your yard, maybe it’s time to spend the money.
Despite the costs — construction of an in-ground pool can cost as much as $59,000 in New Jersey — interest in pools, like the temperature, is soaring.
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More people want pools, and need to get them serviced, as the prime swimming season has stretched beyond the typical summer months.
There were 374,000 residential pools in New Jersey as of this year, according to the luxury real estate firm RubyHome.
“Climate change has changed the swimming pool,” said Isaac Keselman, founding president of the Aqua Doctor, a pool service company in East Hanover.
“If I dial it back to the 1980s, it was very popular as Memorial Day to Labor Day,” he said. Thanks to climate change, the pool season in New Jersey has been stretched to April through October, continued Keselman, also vice president of the Northeast Spa and Pool Association.
Of the 15 warmest summers in New Jersey since 1895, 12 have occurred since the year 2000, according to data provided by David Robinson, New Jersey's state climatologist.
“This is due, primarily, to human-induced climate change,” said Robinson, who also teaches at Rutgers University.
Pool permit applications have spiked in NJ
Hotter weather — and more of it — has meant more treatment and pool servicing, such as pool chemistry, because of heat waves or excessive rain, said Christine Chemerov, who works for Crystal Clean Pools in Montvale.
“We have a lot of weekly service" customer calls, she said. “The number has gone up.”
Pool permit applications in New Jersey have spiked in recent years, according to data by the nationwide group the Pool & Hot Tub Alliance:
- 2020: 1,414 applications
- 2021: 1,729 applications
- 2022: 4,949 applications
- 2023: 4,625 applications
“People are investing in their homes and their backyards, and the pool industry is certainly a part of that,” said Dominick Mondi, a longtime landscaper and executive director of the Northeast Spa and Pool Association.
In the long run, does a pool make you better off?
Finance website Bankrate estimated that the addition of a pool can boost one’s home value by roughly 7%.
But that comes with a major asterisk that “the cost of pool installation and ongoing maintenance expenses may outweigh the potential value increase.”
There’s also the environmental consideration: Advocates say pools have a detrimental impact on the environment.
The average swimming pool takes between 18,000 and 20,000 gallons to fill, and that does not factor in water splashing out, as well as water lost to evaporation.
And the pool pump could use up between 3,000 and 5,000 kilowatt hours of electricity a year, costing between $480 and $800, according to Angi (formerly Angie’s List).
“Traditional pools invoke the trifecta of environmental destruction: high water use, high energy use, and harmful chemicals,” reads a post by the environmental group the Sierra Club.
The Sierra Club recommends covering your pool when not in use, if not every summer night, then at least during the “pool’s ‘off season’.”
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“Keeping it covered for a few extra weeks each year can save hundreds of gallons of water,” the Sierra Club said.
Rather than chlorine to kill bacteria and algae, saltwater pools might be a cleaner alternative, as would a “natural” pool that uses plants to filter out harmful biological material, according to the University of Rochester.
How to save money on your pool
The pool cover has the added benefit of protecting water from evaporation, and thus less money is spent on refilling the pool, said Leslie’s Pool Supplies.
Tools and equipment should be kept out of the sunlight so they don’t have to be replaced as frequently.
“Run your single speed pump one hour for every 10 [degrees Fahrenheit] of air temperature each day to keep the water clean and moving to prevent algae. If you have a variable speed pump, run the pump on high speed for at least [three to four] hours, and run it on low speed for an additional [eight to 10] hours per day to keep the water healthy,” said Leslie’s.
Daniel Munoz covers business, consumer affairs, labor and the economy for NorthJersey.com and The Record.
Email:munozd@northjersey.com; Twitter:@danielmunoz100andFacebook
