You probably haven’t given too much thought to your home’s air conditioning recently—mostly because of worries over hurricane issues. Thankfully, the year’s did less damage than expected to the Tampa Bay area, and many homeowners are going to turn their thoughts to more prosaic preparations for the rest of the year.
But why think about your air conditioning in St Petersburg, FL at this time? There are several reasons. First, your AC may have sustained water damage during the hurricane. If you have any suspicions about this, please contact our team right away to make an inspection and help you with decisions about what’s best for your AC. This also applies to your heating system.
Second, fall is always an excellent time to consider whether you need to replace an aging air conditioner that hasn’t sustained hurricane damage. You just went through an intense summer and had plenty of opportunities to see if your air conditioner is still working at its best. If it isn’t, the slower fall season easily accommodates scheduling an installation with our professionals.
Ways to Tell Your AC Is Ready for Replacement
This is our short guide to the signs that an air conditioner is no longer worth repairing and should instead go to the recycling yard:
- System age: Most central air conditioners will not last far beyond 15 years, and we recommend owners watch for signs of extreme wear on any system that’s older than 12 years.
- High utility bills: An air conditioner uses more electrical energy than any appliance in a home except for an electric water heater. If an AC is wearing down, it will lose its energy efficiency and begin to make a larger drain on electrical power. If you can’t account for higher electricity bills, you may need to look into the AC.
- Uneven cooling: When a central air conditioner isn’t evenly cooling the entire house and leaves hot spots in rooms, it warns that the system is losing its cooling capacity. This often warns that the AC is near to failing.
- Noisy operation: Has the sound from your air conditioner become more noticeable than before when it runs? It shouldn’t be this way. The AC is warning that it’s too worn down.
- Expensive repairs: If you get a repair quote for your air conditioner that’s more than half the price of purchasing a new system, that’s too costly. Put that money toward the replacement rather than toward a system that may only last a year or two more.
We don’t recommend you simply let your air conditioning system run and run until it fully fails. This not only traps you with an emergency replacement situation, but it also means money going to waste on an inefficient AC system that isn’t even doing its full job.
You can rely on Balanced Air to give you an honest assessment of your air conditioning system and whether a replacement is the best option this fall.
Contact us today for AC service and experience the Balanced Air, Inc. difference!
