When Is It Time to Replace Your Furnace?
With the fall season approaching, it’s time to start thinking about your furnace. A quick maintenance call should be able to give you an update on the status of your furnace. We especially recommend it for furnaces since carbon monoxide leaks are more prevalent in aged systems that haven’t been inspected recently.
In the event that your furnace is nearing the end of its life or beyond repair, a replacement may be in order. Here are a few signs that you should start thinking about replacement.
Age
Furnaces last about 15 to 20 years on average. While some have been known to last as long as 30 years, it’s not a number to rely on. By the time your furnace hits the 15-year mark, or when the furnace is needing excessive repairs, you should already begin doing research into your replacement.
This will ensure that you’ll already have your new furnace sorted out if the current one breaks down during a crucial time of the season. A little early planning will prevent you from having to make a last-minute replacement on just any system that looks good (and it’ll look really good when you’re stuck in the cold with no other options!).
Higher Energy Bills
When your furnace gets older, it will have a more difficult time operating at normal standards. This is the natural process for any machine, whether it’s your car, your air conditioner, or your furnace. The more a machine is forced to function at less-than-satisfactory performance, the more problems it will bring.
One of the ways you’ll see this manifest is through higher energy bills. An explanation for why this happens is because your furnace will do whatever it takes to reach the temperature you’ve set on the thermostat. If the furnace’s age prevents it from being fully efficient, it will have to run longer than usual to meet that temperature. One result of that extra energy is a higher energy bill. Another result would be…
More Equipment Repairs
When your system has to work harder than usual—and for longer than usual—it will suffer through increased wear-and-tear. While wear-and-tear is unavoidable over time, the difference is that these aged parts are now being put under stress for longer periods. This is what leads to broken parts and the need to call an HVAC contractor in Tacoma, WA.
You’ll often be told that a good time to replace your system is when the cost of repairs is beginning to rival the cost of replacement. But that means you’d be paying the cost of two replacements! A much better rule of thumb is to wait until the machine requires a third repair in the same year. If you’ve already had maintenance and are still experiencing more than a couple breakdowns, you can be more certain that the problem is the system itself.