Every summer in SW FL, responsible homeowners are in a state of preparedness. You’ve got emergency cash set aside, you’ve budgeted for tree trimming and storm shutters, you’ve got generator funds in the bank and you’ve got reserves for that one unexpected deductible.
Fortunately, this hurricane season has been very quiet for Sarasota.
Avoiding the major tropical hits is a massive relief, of course, but it also means that a lot of homeowners are left with unspent emergency funds. Rather than let that money sit around and get consumed slowly by the normal running of the household, late fall is the ideal time to go back and re-invest that capital into your home’s single most valuable asset: your HVAC system.
How to Reinvest Your Unused Hurricane Budget into Your Home
After four months of non-stop running to fight the Florida heat and humidity your AC has been absolutely ripped to shreds. That’s why it makes such good sense to reallocate your storm prep budget towards HVAC upgrades, deferred repairs or a full system replacement at this very moment.
Capitalize on the Fall “Shoulder Season” for New Installs
If your system is struggling through July and August you’re probably going to be looking at the end of its life. Waiting until it fails during the first 95 degree wave in June is going to mean you’re buying under emergency conditions (when stock is low, installers are booked out days ahead and prices are at their highest).
October and November are the HVAC ‘shoulder seasons’ in Sarasota.
Better Availability and Flexibility
Installation schedules are now open so you can pick your own install dates and system models without having to go through a multi-day wait.
Instant Utility Savings and Rebates
Upgrading to a modern high efficiency SEER2 unit is eligible for instant utility credits (e.g. FPL’s $200 instant A/C rebate) and will reduce your monthly electric bill by as much as 30% to 40%.
Reinvesting That Emergency Cash
This enables you to get a 10 year parts warranty and remove the worry of your AC breaking down before next summer.
Take Care of the “Summer Hangover” Repairs
Even if your system didn’t suffer a complete shutdown, the continuous summer runtime will wear out the critical electrical and mechanical components.
Common issues that quietly develop over the summer include:
- Weakened capacitors and pitted contactors running on borrowed time.
- Clogged, sludgy condensate drain lines – ready for an overflow switch trip.
- Heavy salt air and grime build up, insulating your outdoor condenser coils.
Fixing these issues now will prevent a crisis level service bottleneck later on when the first bit of cold weather comes along, and you need your heat pump’s auxiliary strips to come on properly.
Upgrade to Permanent System Protections
If you’ve done your storm season prep you’ll know that power grid instability is Florida’s biggest hidden hazard. A quiet hurricane season in no way mitigates the fact that the daily summer afternoon squalls and the grid restorations that follow them will generate nasty voltage spikes through the local utility lines.
Redirecting a few hundred dollars into permanent system upgrades protects your equipment for years to come:
- Dedicated HVAC surge protection: fitted directly at the outdoor disconnect to protect the sensitive microprocessors and the expensive variable speed inverter boards from utility spikes.
- Whole home dehumidification or UV purification: This will help keep the indoor humidity below 50% all year and will prevent mold from growing in the dark ductwork during the humid shoulder months.
- Smart thermostat installation: optimizes cycle times and monitors system performance automatically, giving you early warning indicators before a small fault becomes a catastrophic failure.
Put Your Home Improvement Dollars to Work with D&D Air
Getting through storm season without a scratch is a victory. The sensible thing to do is to take advantage of that momentum and get on with the business of improving your home’s comfort, protecting your equipment and reducing your energy bills before the next summer.
For 40 years D&D Air has been providing Sarasota, Bradenton and Venice homeowners with straightforward, transparent pricing on full tune-ups, full system overhauls and energy efficient installations.
Call D&D Air at (941) 297-0089 to book your fall system assessment or to get a quote on upgrading your AC system.
