It's simplier than it looks... The only maintenance we have to do on it is the following:
- Change the blue "Carbon Filter" once a year - $20
- Change the UV Light once a year - $100 (Can be run longer, but for safety)
- Fill Salt Bucket every month - $20 (we use lots of salt)
- Clean Salt Bucket once a year - Pretty much free
- Change R.O. Filters in R.O. unit - $100 / YR
- Shock the well with Chlorine every month - $2
Total cost per year: $484 / yr for the cleanest purest water you can get. Free of heavy metals, bacteria and nasty other stuff found in city water including Chlorine!
Plus the money we save on soap/shampoo in the shower and the on Dish detergent, Laundry detergent and fabric softener it cuts that bill by a quarter and leaves us with a bill of $363
Once you have this water you won't want to go back to city water.
In the 3 years we have owned the system, nothing has broken down and the well pump is just over 10 years old with a 15 year warranty so I'm pretty sure it's cheap.
Now with City water you could add just the Blue carbon filter and the R.O. unit and possibly a softener and have my quality of water.