We gave ours to a friend to use at his lake cabin.

$100 a year is probably close. It depends on the size and efficiency, your local electricity rates, and how full you keep the fridge is (a full fridge uses less energy than an empty one). It also depends on your climate--refrigerators actually use a bit less energy in a cold-climate garage than they do in your house, since they don't have work as hard when the ambient temperature is colder.

In general, second refrigerators are expensive to run and underutilized.

I wouldn't keep it as a second fridge--to me, getting an appropriately sized fridge should be part of the point of a remodel. If you still need another fridge, you failed. :P

Of course, there are lifestyles that require a second fridge, and that's okay too, but if you didn't need a second one before, just let it go.

Climate ... it would be fighting the heat more than the cold. We keep ac on from April to Sept/October.

If you've done without one and NOT had a huge inconvenience, you could probably continue.

Put it on Craigslist or recycle it.

For me, I live in the country and I do a lot of bulk cooking so a second fridge has always come in handy.

In the past we have moved our old fridge out to the garage when we got a new one but this time when we remodeled we actually purchased 2 new fridges, a French door for the kitchen and a side by side for the pantry. I do prefer having it in the house where it is more climate controlled.

Mine has been in the garage for 12 years. We use it constantly for drinks and every other kind of storage. The freezer not so much. No idea what it costs to run but a replacement from Lowe's is $400. I'm leaving it there till it dies. Then they can pay me $50 to recycle it.

Yes we kept ours. Freezer doesn't work and I think it's a few degrees warmer than it should be. Works out perfectly for beverages and making cheese.
I have used it on the coldest setting several times when we are doing our meat butchering so the meat stays colder than if it were sitting out while I am doing all the cuts.

Most of the time it stays unplugged so we don't have electricity costs but when we need it it's there.

We kept ours and put it in the basement. I keep things in there all the time: sports drinks for my son; frozen items like extra containers of spaghetti sauce if I make a big batch; beer (which I don't drink often but when friends come over the guys always want some); and especially when I'm hosting a big party or holiday dinner. Great for brining a couple of turkeys, which I wouldn't have room for in my kitchen fridge, or chilling a couple of watermelons in the summer.

We kept ours. Stuck it in the garage. Filled it with frozen apples from our tree, then... it gave out. Neighbor put the apples in their freezer, and used some for pies. We weighed it hard, and just got the old thing fixed. Works fine now. I'll be up to my ears in apples again in June. California. Anna Apple. Ripens in June. Prolific tree.

I did not. Although it was still functioning fine (and wasn't in my original plan to replace it) I am pressed for space in both the 1-car garage and the basement. I though hard about it and decided that I would likely fill up the extra frig space (mostly unnecessarily) but then not really remember or quickly use the contents, and what I needed most was more freezer room rather than refrigerated room. I did take advantage of the recycling offer -- I also kept the shelf brackets, shelves and bins to re-purpose in the basement.

I've always had a second fridge in the garage. My mom did too. I find it really handy and it allows me to have a modest sized fridge in the kitchen, which I prefer.

We put ours in the laundry room when we did our reno 5 years ago. I am so glad we have it. We have a 36" CD fridge and it just isn't big enough for a family of four. At least for our family of four.

We've lived here 28 years and had one in the garage forever, I honestly don't remember how long. Would not be without it. Great for holidays when you're making up a bunch of food (or parties), plus just spillover from whatever. Bottled water, and various drinks. I buy lots of veggies at one time, really crowds the inside frig if it's all in there. I wouldn't ever be without one. (and it's just 2 of us now)

Not keeping old fridge. It isn't that old and works fine; we only replaced it because we wanted to add a larger CD unit framed with cabinetry. It would have been destined for the basement but DH, who worked hard to clear out all the stuff this spring, was against the idea and we didn't really need it for extra cold storage for our 2-person household. Fridge is going to friends who will use it to replace their original 17 year old unit.

We kept ours. So glad we did. It's almost 15 years old. Right now it has sodas, gatorades, extra milk, waters and some wine in it. It's in the garage and we have been doing tons of yard work, mulching, mowing, planting a garden Instead of running through the house with dirty boots ( or having to take them off) we grab drinks from the fridge. Even though I bought a big French door fridge for the remodel I host most family functions, so I know I will use the garage fridge for holiday/party overflow. Plus we have young kids playing sports, lots of friends over especially in the summer to swim. So glad we kept it. You can keep it and if you don't find yourself using it, you could sell it. People are always looking for an extra fridge.

We kept the doesn't-fit-into-design-but-it-works fridge in the vacation/eventual retirement house. When it craps out, we'll replace. We'd consider replacing it and using it as a spare garage fridge except that it's fairly new. And we have learned, painfully, that newish fridges don't work very well when the ambient temperature drops below 50. The electronics get confused. We've gotten pretty good at changing out boards.
I'd grab a craigslist fridge pre 2000 if I wanted a garage fridge in a colder climate unless it was to be unplugged in the winter.

We kept our old fridge and now use it in the new kitchen. It was about eight years old at the time, but looked good, performed well for us and we didn't see the point of helping to fill up a landfill. It was amusing watching the cabinet installers demo and put in the new cabinets without moving the fridge.

We got rid of ours. I have an extra freezer in the pantry for overflow. I didn't really have a use for it. It froze everything in the refrigerator side. That was the reason for getting rid of it in the first place. Getting rid of that beast of a refrigerator was the start of a full kitchen renovation.

I know people have a hard time getting rid of things. I just came from a neighbor's tag sale. After 50 years together, they went to the retirement home. It's amazing how much junk you can collect under the guise of we might have a use for it someday. Most of it needed to be thrown away 20 years ago. It's even more distasteful watching people pick over junk as if the holy grail is in the pile. I left empty handed with the resolve to empty out a closet today.

Send it to the dump or to someone who really needs it. If you don't have a specific use for it, get rid of it.

Something else I thought of this morning, they are great for thawing turkeys without infringing on frig space!

When we replace, I'll take that $50 from the electric company and buy a small dorm/bar fridge for the couple of times a year I need to store a cake or beer. I do have a separate freezer, the defrost-it-myself type, because it's way better than the one with the fridge for stocking up.

Do NOT do what my mother is doing, which is keep a refrigerator you do not need so it takes up space, you're always walking around it, and eventually it stops working and you don't notice and you have a smelly mess.

@homechef -- you are so right.

We kept our 10 year old fridge in the garage, we use it for mostly for drinks and overflow, but I wouldn't be without it. It replaced a mini-fridge that is now on the patio, also used for drinks and snacks for the pool area. I would have no problem donating it if it was of no use to us, but not having the guys traipsing through the house for drinks while working in the yard or on the cars is reason enough for me to keep it!

Nope - I do have a chest freezer in the basement.

We have my grandfather's old refrigerator (prob 20+ years old) as a second refrigerator in our basement. It's handy to keep sparkling water chilled (I drink a lot of it) and sometimes when I prep food for the weekend, the extra space is nice. I'm not sure its worth the energy it guzzles but I have no idea what that is, so it stays and gets used somewhat.

I've always had an old refrigerator either in the garage or basement. Depending on the climate you live in you really can't put the newer ones out in the cold because of the electronics. The units I have now are over thirty years old but just keep working.

I have four teenage boys, so yes, we have two refrigerators. There are no appropriately sized fridges offered for that demographic. Sometimes I feel like a third could come in handy.

We kept ours in the garage. I guess we failed to Fori, but funkycamper, well said! We couldn't have the huge refrigerator of our dreams in our kitchen, but have a really nice built in that allows for a nicer walkway and workspace. Some of us have limitations to our dreams, but find ways to make it happen.

So glad we kept it! When it died 5 years later, we replaced it! Could not live without it.

Party fridge, space for keg when DH and DS make beer, extra room for DH's pizza and bread doughs in cold fermentation, my frozen cookie dough for gift giving at holidays, I could go.

We cook, alot!

Honestly, until this thread was posted, I didn't realize that it WASN'T the norm.

Everyone I know has an old fridge in the garage.

My grandparents house has an old fridge with an icebox built in. It is probably from the 40s if I had to guess. There is a latch you have to undo at the bottom in order to open it. They always kept drinks in it for when the family was there.

In my house, I currently have 5 fridges....yes 5. I've got my main one in the kitchen where I store everything I need for making meals; fresh veggies, cheese, milk, meat, condiments, etc. I have a second fridge in the pantry which stores drinks (sodas, bottled water, juice boxes for the kids, alcohol, etc) and the things needed for the kids daily school lunches. When I have a big party or get together, I rearrange it and I store large platters, cakes, etc. I use the freezer on it to store extra make ahead meals as well as all the ice cream, popscicles, frozen pizza, unhealthy indulgences, etc.

In the basement we have a very small beverage fridge in my husbands office to store beers and mountain dew for him and his buddies.

I have a MIL quarters attached to my house and the kitchen has a regular full size fridge and then I have a 2000 sq ft shop where we build everything and store our lawn equipment, etc which has a large freezer fridge. We store beverages in the fridge section for when we are outside working and the freezer is for my mom (who lives in the MIL quarters) to use as her excess cold storage.

It actually reminds me of when I bought my latest vehicle. I had a 94 suburban I was going to use as a trade in. They were going to give me a 1000 dollars for my trade in. After discussing with my husband, we decided that we wouldn't be able to buy a "work truck" for a thousand dollars and we wouldn't want my new SUV getting all the wear and tear on the mechanical components OR having the inside destroyed from all the things we might move/haul and we decided it was better to "buy" our old suburban for 1000 and pay for the minimum insurance on it than it was to get rid of it.

If you think there is even a CHANCE that you would use it, it would be better to "buy" (for go the rebate) your old fridge for 50 dollars and pay the minimum insurance (electric bill) than it would be to get rid of it and decide in the future that you could use the space and spend a 1000+ getting a new one.

" If I had a huge kitchen fridge with room for all of this in it, it would drive me crazy and I would be sure to lose stuff stored behind other things only to find a science experiment later. "

LOL!! Well said.

And TexasGem, I too thought it was the norm! Just about everyone I know has at least one extra.

I kept mine in the basement for 7-8 years until it died last summer. Nice to have the extra storage, basically for cases of gatorade and other beverages.
Casey