How hard is the water in Lee County, FL?
29.4 grains per gallon
A softener will pay its way here.
The median hardness measured in Lee County, FL is 503 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 29.4 gpg. That is very hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 32 samples at 29 sites between 1996 and 2019, drawn from groundwater wells, which is what most taps and private wells in the county draw on.
How much it varies here
Half the sites came in between 20.2 and 40.3 gpg. The whole middle of that range gives the same answer, so a test of your own tap is unlikely to change it. Confidence in the county figure: high (how it is measured).
What to do next
At 29.4 gpg a softener pays its way here. Before you buy, check the quoted unit's grain capacity against the sizing table below, and ask whether it regenerates on demand, which uses less salt than a timer. Call your utility for its own report if you are on city water.
More on sizing a softener for your household.
From 7.1 to 60.8 gpg
The softest single sample on record in Lee County was 122 mg/L and the hardest 1,040 mg/L, a 9-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 40.3 gpg and the bottom quarter below 20.2 gpg.
Wells 29.4 gpg, rivers and lakes 16.4 gpg
32 groundwater samples from 29 wells put the median at 503 mg/L. 10,685 surface samples from 151 sites put it at 280 mg/L. In Lee County the wells come out 13.0 gpg harder. Groundwater sits in contact with rock for years and picks up calcium and magnesium as it goes, so wells usually read harder. A utility here that draws from the river can deliver noticeably different water from a private well next door.
What a softener would cost to run
For a household of 3, a 40,000-grain unit covers a week between regenerations. Expect about 642 lb of salt a year (17 bags of 40 lb, about $116), and roughly 2,346 gallons of regeneration water. Installed, most units run $1,000 to $4,500; spread over 15 years with salt, that is about $216 a year.
Sizing at 29.4 gpg
| People | Grains a day | Unit | Salt a year |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1,764 | 24,000 | 215 lb |
| 2 | 3,528 | 32,000 | 429 lb |
| 4 | 7,056 | 64,000 | 858 lb |
| 6 | 10,584 | 80,000 | 1,288 lb |
Lee County against the rest of Florida
Among the 67 Florida counties with data, Lee County is number 2 of 67 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 94% of counties.
Softest in Florida: Washington County at 0.3 gpg. Hardest: Sarasota County at 32.2 gpg. Closest to Lee County: Charlotte County (26.7), Sarasota County (32.2), St. Lucie County (21).