It's unlikely, but there should be a shutoff valve on the cold feed to your WH, if so, close it and see if anybody complains of course you won't have any HW either, but it might be worth it to prove a point). If no shut off valve, turn off the breaker to the WH. BTW, you haven't shared any numbers, what is your "extremely high bill"? So I also assume your WH is being metered separately somehow? Please edit your post with more details so we can give good answers.

How do they know how much to charge you for electricity? There must be an electric meter somewhere. If that's the meter you pay off of, then you are entitled to total control of every circuit breaker past that meter. Turn off stuff you are not using. A tank heater takes about 45 minutes to come up, and once at temperature you can shut it off, and then use the water. If anyone else is using water, they'll get the dregs. For A/C, just shut it off entirely or push it to 90 or 95. You're not there!

My electric bill was 195 for one month, 165 a month with 2 weeks of not being home. I have never had a bill over 80 before moving here. As stated I can't find a cutoff anywhere around the water heater. I tried turning the breaker off, but not sure that worked. I will have to search for the meter, that is the one thing I havent checked yet. As far as turning things off I don't have a lot of things on, a light in the room I'm in and TV, if I'm watching TV. And then the refrigerator and A/C If I turn the A/C up to 90 I'll end up sick. I have issues with migraines and nausea at that temp.

In my experience the electric bill doesn't specify what is causing your individual high bill, but rather suggests typical causes, so it might not be your water heater. A refrigerator will use a lot of power, especially in an 80F room! Definitely find where your electrical circuit breaker panel is, and where your meter is, if that's in a different place. Also, with all the craziness in TX with gas and electricity, did the price per kilowatt hour change? Maybe a special surcharge?

Kitchen temp is more like 74 normally, not 80, but I will check the meter in the daytime I believe the meter is in a shared yard, or outside the fence of the shared yard.

The PRV could be leaking hot water. Turn off the breaker and test the voltage and temperature at the water heater to verify power's off.

It's more likely that you're "sharing" your electricity.

Pick a nice busy early evening time, nicely shut down all your plugged in electronics, take a walk around the building observing what's lit up, go back in and shut off your main breaker. Take another walk around the building and see if parts other than your personal space seem to have lost power.

And if you buy just 5 of the Kill A Watt to monitor 5 outlets, it will only cost you $140.

@Ruskes Unless a super-urgent situation, OP only needs one Kill-a-Watt and can use for a day or two with each appliance.

@Concernedrenter In TX you can choose your electricity supplier and rates can vary wildly. Better to look at actual usage, measured in kWh. You may just be paying twice as much for your electricity as before? Also consider the type of space you rent as compared to before - townhomes will use more electricity to cool than a 1BR apartment, for instance.

That said, if this is a single townhouse that was converted to have 4 separate units, it's entirely possible the plumbing, electrical, and HVAC were never separated when it was split into rentals. I once had a sketchy landlord who did that - my unit paid utilities separate and another unit had utilities "included in rent" - but it was actually me paying for them. Broke the lease very quick after finding that out...

Do not shut off the water to your water heater, unless you want to ruin the heating element! The proper way to shut off a water heater is to turn off the electricity to it.

San Antonio - in August? Do you even need a water heater at this time of year? I'd think in the summer, your electricity would mostly be going to A/C...

I think the Kill-a-Watt might be a waste of time (certainly more than 1 is a waste) because the problem appliances are almost certainly hardwired and 240V. "My electric bill was 195 for one month, 165 a month with 2 weeks of not being home. I have never had a bill over 80 before moving here." <-- I think that's part of your problem. You have no idea what is normal for the building. If your previous home was a lower floor apartment with no south or west facing walls, your A/C load would have been much lower.

@Glen and the other advantage of shutting off the POWER is because it is a tank, it's still full of hot water and you can use it normally. Yes, it will run out eventually, but it already does that when the power is on. So no practical difference. An hour before you need hot water again, turn it back on. In the meantime it's hard off.

You don't need to have the A/C at 90 while you are there. Have it at a comfortable setting while you are there. When you are NOT there, set it to 90 or off. When coming home from work, run in, set it to 74, then go out again for an hour to let it cool down. Or, get a programmable thermostat that does that for you.

May I suggest you redact personal information from one of your bills and post it here? The answers are going in wildly different directions, and seeing the bill will help rule out many possibilities.