Electric in floor heating in the master bathroom is a true luxury feature in an upgraded inner city property. I like to use the schluter brand system where the heat cable feeds into the ditra underlayment that the tile is installed on.
The heating cable is about $500, the ditra $3.5/ft and the thermostat can vary between $100-300. For about $1000 plus some install cost and a dedicated circuit at the panel this upgrade can be included in any new house.
What was not clear was how much the system costs to operate on a daily or monthly basis. Given that our low electricity costs today are as much fee based as consumption based further confuses the matter.
By upgrading to a newer touch screen thermostat that is much more feature rich than an earlier model we can now track heated floor energy consumption. Prior to this I had no way to know how much electricity it would take to hear the tile.
Using two heat cycles in the morning and late evening, it appears the system is using less than $2 per week. $2 a week for the entire heating season does not seem too bad given how cold the tile floors can feel when the system is off. A consequence of having a skylight in the master bathroom is the room will be colder than if the glass area was smaller. My advice is to put this system in any new or renovated master bathroom. It is a nice upgrade and appears very cost effective to operate each winter. It is also a feature impossible to add if the house is finished.
This is the delux touchscreen thermostat I installed. The other model I removed was programmable but has a very cumbersome interface. This unit is far superior to that one. I used a roughly estimated cost of 5 cents per kWh so the unit can track consumption cost on a daily or even annual basis.