Oil up a dime, propane down 20 cents: Upper Valley prices, Oct. 20

Every Tuesday I call local dealers for their heating oil and propane prices. This week I got prices from 15 dealers for oil and 12 for propane, including five dealers new to the list. Here’s what changed, and a few things in the numbers I didn’t expect.

The short version:

• Heating oil went up about a dime. Of the 10 dealers I priced both last week and this week, six raised their price, three held, and one dropped. The lowest price is still $5.69/gal.
• Propane went down about 20 cents. Five of the eight dealers I could compare cut their price. The lowest is $2.20/gal.
• Shopping around matters more for propane than for oil. The cheapest and priciest oil are 70 cents apart. For propane, the gap is $1.95 a gallon.

Heating oil: up about 10 cents

The middle of the pack moved up: the typical change among dealers I priced both weeks was a dime, and Inov8v Energy went up 30 cents. Suburban Propane was the only one to come down (11 cents). Heatable and Rymes Propane & Oil are tied for the lowest price at $5.69/gal, and Rymes has been at $5.69 every week since Oct. 6.

Here’s a surprise: only five of the 15 are below the Vermont average of $6.03 (Vermont Department of Public Service, week of Oct. 12), and the typical Upper Valley price, $6.19, is above it. New Hampshire’s survey that week was $5.97.

On a 200-gallon delivery, the difference between the cheapest and priciest dealer this week is $140.

Propane: down about 20 cents

Propane went the other way. Cota & Cota dropped 48 cents, and Thomson Fuels, Dead River and Eastern Propane & Oil each came down 25 to 31 cents. Suburban Propane went up 50 cents.

* Simple Energy quoted $2.51 this week, down from $4.04, but I don’t think that’s a real price cut. This week I was careful to ask for the price for a customer who owns their tank; last week’s quote was probably for a tank leased from the dealer. So I’ve left Simple Energy out of the week-to-week comparison. More on tanks below.

What stands out is the spread. R.E. Hinkley quoted $2.20/gal and HB Energy Solutions $4.15/gal. For a house that burns about 800 gallons of propane a year, that’s the difference between about $1,760 and $3,320 a year. Ten of the 12 dealers came in under the Vermont average of $3.69, the opposite of oil.

If your propane price is near the top of this chart, it may be worth asking your dealer about it, or looking into switching. Many households lease their tank from their dealer, which makes switching harder, but not impossible.

A year ago, oil was $2.60 a gallon cheaper

The year-over-year numbers are the biggest story. In the week of Oct. 20, 2025, the Vermont average for heating oil was $3.41/gal (U.S. Energy Information Administration). This October it’s $6.03, about 77% higher. Most of that jump came last March, when the average went from $4.14 to $5.56 in four weeks. The state survey picked up this October even higher, at $5.99.

Propane barely moved over the same year: $3.57 then, $3.69 now.

One more thing from last winter’s numbers: the cheapest week for heating oil in Vermont, of every week from October to March, was the week of Oct. 20. That’s no promise about this year. Nobody knows where prices go from here, and I won’t guess.

Heat for heat, propane is cheaper right now

A gallon of oil holds more heat than a gallon of propane (about 138,500 BTU against 91,500, per the EIA), so the per-gallon prices aren’t a fair fight. Here’s what a million BTU of heat costs at this week’s prices, before your boiler’s or furnace’s efficiency:

“Typical” is the middle price of the dealers I called. Put another way, oil at $5.69 matches propane at about $3.76 a gallon. Most of us can’t switch fuels overnight, but if you heat with both, or you’re choosing a new system, it’s worth knowing.

Four things to ask when you call

1. “Is that the pay-on-time price?” Ten of the 15 oil prices above are the price if you pay within a set number of days, usually 10. Pay late and it’s typically a dime more (20 cents at CV Oil). Thomson Fuels’ discount needs payment within a day.
2. “What’s your minimum?” If cash is tight and you need a little oil, Eastern Propane & Oil delivers as little as 50 gallons, at $5.85/gal. Rymes, one of the two cheapest, needs 200 gallons. Most dealers start at 100.
3. “Is that for a tank I own?” (Propane.) The same dealer can quote very different prices for an owned tank and a leased one; at Simple Energy the gap may be as much as $1.50 a gallon. All the propane prices here are for a 500-gallon tank the customer owns. If you lease, ask what you’d pay, and what it would take to own your tank.
4. “Is that this week’s price?” Prices really do move week to week. Suburban Propane was tied for the cheapest oil on Oct. 6 and had the highest price a week later.

All prices here are cash-on-delivery prices from my calls on Tuesday, Oct. 20, for a standard delivery. They change often, so confirm with the dealer before you order. See every dealer’s current price, and the prices in your town, on the price list. I’ll post one of these after each Tuesday’s calls.