Cost of installing central heating - electric or gas heat

[Gerald E. Wilkins]

I'll be moving soon to Lawrenceville, Virginia (Southeast, VA.) can some one give me an idea of a price to replace a central heating and airconditioning unit. The house is approximately 884 sq ft, small two bedroom/one bath, one level home. Current unit is propane gas for heating and electric airconditioning. A technician came out and said the heat exchanger is gone. considering a new unit versus replacing parts. Any ideas?

[Jessie Chen]

I have an old character home with a built up area 280m2 split level. The house is still cold despite it has already wall mounted gas heaters installed on the 3 main living rooms plus an existing HRV system. I have recently had the floor insulation done but undecided which system should I get either a gas driven central heating system or just wall mounted heat pumps.

Appreciate if someone can give me advice on this. Thank you.

[julejulejuju]

my mother lives in the home she grew up as in a child in Colorado, she is now 70 years old, she heats her home by a pellet stove.she has to carry in 40 lb bags of pellets to fill her stove which she pulls with a wagon.She cant leave her house for even one day in the winter because someone has to be there to fill the stove or everything will freeze. Needless to say she is geting to the age where this is difficult. I would love to have some kind of central heating installed in her home so that on her senior years she wont have to worry about carrying in pellets. As far as I know there are no vents through the house. it is a very small less then 1000 sq ft Im looking for the cheapest price I can find. Funds are low but this must be done

[poptones]

I bought a 10 year old new old stock Trane off ebay for $550 and paid a local guy about $1200 to install it in my attic along with a used AC system he had replaced for another customer (they added onto to the house and it was too small). I must say I sort of got what I paid for - I think I did a bit better, but I am certain a better job would have come from someone who was bonded and could be held responsible for redoing the awkwardly placed vent hole he cut in my living room ceiling.

Anyway I didn't really have any experience picking furnaces and this one was a good buy (brand new, still in cardboard, but out of its ten year warranty) so it's too small for my house alone, but it does keep the house warm enough in winter I can leave without fear of everything freezing. I also have a large gas heater in the dining room (one of those glorious antique gas hearths) that can SUCK some gas, and a fireplace in the living room that I use when it gets really cold and the furnace can't keep up alone.

I have gas heat. One thing to consider for budgeting: in the summer I use about $10 a month worth of gas. In the coldest part of winter I use a couple hundred or more. But in the summer I use AC so my electric goes up to $300 a month during peak heat. But by using "level billing" I can always count on my utilities running about $350 a month. I hate to think what my electric bill would be if I used electric heat AND AC.

[creeksitter]

Geez Pop - sound like you need some insulation. Or maybe just some caulking and great stuff. There are gizmos at the home improvement stores that will show you where the air leaks are. Shrink wrap plastic for the windows? Your gas logs are probably inefficient. Best to turn them off and stuff insulation in plastic bags up the chimney - take it out for special occasions.

[poptones]

Yeah I could do with a LOT of insulation. The house is 100 years old and has foundation problems. I got it leveled up but I need a couple of timbers replaced and I need a new roof over part of it (leaking roof is what caused the rot underneath). It was a foreclosure deal I paid cash for, problem is for now I don't have money for all the other repairs. I'm hoping to get the roof repaired next year using a student loan - I really don't want to go the mortgage route - then I can have some insulation blown in the ceiling. I know it sounds like a lot, but I paid less for my house than I paid for my car (a 2005 Magnum SXT with 32000 Mi on it) and it's a pretty large house with hardwood floors throughout, about 1000sq ft total of porch and deck, and is located in a very nice neighborhood. I have no doubt it will be a good investment and for now I have a safe place to sit out the bubble.

It looks like there's some experienced hvac folks here. My contribution was just to point out there are inexpensive ways to retrofit a house with more modern heating and cooling. If I were ten years younger and in a bit better shape I would have done the work myself. If I had been in good enough shape to work with the fellow (or at least go behind and inspect what he had done in my attic) it might have been done a little better too. Still, ocnsidering it was half what I would have otherwise paid, I'm ok with it. I'm confident once the house has some insulation it will be better. As it is now, my system maintains about a 27 degree max differential - that is, when it's 25 outside, it's 52 in the house! Thankfully it don't get that cold here very long.

[creeksitter]

Brrr. If I were you I'd invest in a couple of space heaters - the radiator things that you can run at low wattage in case the wiring is old. I'd pick a couple of those and heat just a couple of rooms.

Meanwhile - get a caulk gun, a half dozen caulks in appropriate colors and a couple of great stuff cans.

Close all the windows but one and place a big square fan blowing out with cardboard at the sides so you can depressurize the house. Go around to all the edges, trim etc. and feel for the drafts blowing in. If it's a really wide crack, mark it with tape and come back and do those all at once with the great stuff. Please promise me you'll do this at once before cold weather sets in.

P.s . be sure to check the ceiling around the ducts.

[jqcrudup]

I live in Lebanon and in need of a new central air and heating unit. I current unit will heat but there's a pblm with cooling. I was building an additional 2 rooms onto the existing home adding about 750 sq. ft to 1275 sq ft. The contractor went under the house and I think added some duct work...not sure. But I was thinking of replacing my current unit and just adding a new smaller unit for the additional 2 rooms. Do you have any suggestions and some contacts to give a free estimate?

[mrs1885]

Originally Posted by jqcrudup

I live in Lebanon and in need of a new central air and heating unit. I current unit will heat but there's a pblm with cooling. I was building an additional 2 rooms onto the existing home adding about 750 sq. ft to 1275 sq ft. The contractor went under the house and I think added some duct work...not sure. But I was thinking of replacing my current unit and just adding a new smaller unit for the additional 2 rooms. Do you have any suggestions and some contacts to give a free estimate?

Call your electric company. We'd been given an estimate 5 years ago of about $8000. We'd have had to take out a second loan on the house to do it and just weren't in a position to do that at the time. Last February we finally looked into having it done when we got a notice with the electric bill that they will finance a heat and air system for your home and you also get a tax deduction. We called and found out we could get the entire system put in (5 ton unit with duct work, insulation in the attic, etc since there's never been any kind of climate control in the house ever) and they'd finance it at .5% interest for ten years. They just add the payments to our electric bill. The bad part is in the four years since we got the initial estimate to now the price went up to $12,000 and they only finance up to $10,000 so we had $2000 out of pocket. Not the end of the world though. And since the interest rate went from probably in the five percent or more range to a half a percent it was worth it.