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What kind of professional looks at your hot water heater? Plumber? A heating/air guy? I can see that if it's gas. I'm scared to death of hot water heaters, but have no clue who would check it out annually. It's electric.
For an electric water heater, I wouldn't pay for annual service.
You can flush the sediment from the tank, and if it is pretty new maybe have a plumber take a look at it every 3-5 years, replace the sacrificial anode.
There isn't much to check on an old fashioned resistive electric water heater, and both the anode and sediment are tasks you can do yourself, cheap. Other than that, it's just looking for obvious signs of leaks, corrosion.
I usually get it done anywhere from a year and a half to two years. Are you the type to do it annually? Or go longer than that?
For all my life, until 17 years ago, my family's homes were heated by electrically-fired, forced-air oil furnaces. Until I was taught how to tune them up, by a very kind professional furnace repairman, they were never running properly and soot would clog up the works every winter. After I learned how to adjust the firing electrodes properly, that furnace ran very nicely. Some of the so-called professionals who had worked on it previously, didn't even know how to adjust all models. The owner's manual that had come with it, showed the electrode position very far off from what was correct. If you want something done right, learn how to handle it yourself. No one will spend as much time and fuss over the fine details of your equipment, as much as you will for yourself.
We have a service contract with a company that services our HVAC system twice a year---before summer arrives, they come and check the a/c. Before winter arrives, they come and check the heating system.
We don't. Haven't seen the need for it so far in the 32 years that we've owned homes.
(Please don't let my furnace fail tonight!)
I have a co-worker that forks out money for the annual inspection or whatever they call it. They always recommend some sort of work for his system and it costs him extra money.
IMHO,
I think these service contracts are just a way for the HVAC companies to make a few bucks on the service plan and to gain access to your house to "discover" more issues that you can pay them to fix.
I service my oil furnace every other year. Once the furnace gets to be 10 years old (it's 8 years old now) I will service it every year. I never get it gunked up because I run it one day a month in the off season between April/October which keeps any deposits from getting sticky.
We have an oil furnnace with baseboard heat as well. I don't do it every year but I can't argue with anyone who does.
It only costs $125 to clean an oil boiler around here. I always watch them do it. There is always lots of soot buildup on the metal the boiler is trying to heat. Too much buildup and the boiler takes longer to heat, and your loosing that heat up the chimney instead of heating the metal. So your wasting oil.
Have the oil boiler cleaned once a year. The money you save in oil will pay off the cleaning charge very fast.
I don't think the boiler even has a filter on it, not sure. I guess I will go look. The pumps are sealed and cannot be lubricated. The pipes are sealed and contain anti-corrosive/antifreeze chemicals. It can add water automatically if needed, but there is really no place for it to go. Not sure what I would do to it. I do reprogram the thermostats once in a while.
I'm scared to death of hot water heaters, but have no clue who would check it out annually. It's electric.
There is really nothing to check or maintain. At most there is pressure relief valve that will either be on the top or side of the tank. That is going to have an open ended pipe that is pointed at the ground. All hot water heaters are going to have one these. It's recommended to test this once a year or whatever, there is little lever on it and if you operate the lever it will release water from the open ended pipe. After you release the lever it should shut off. Test is complete....
The problem with this test is they often leak afterward and that leak is not part of the valve functioning safely. Operating the lever again may or may not get the leak to stop. This is why most people do not test them. Minimally they should be replaced when new water heater is installed.
The other thing to check is that it is not currently leaking. If it is there is three possible reasons. Thermal expansion of the hot water can raise the pressure in the system and cause it to leak because of normal operation, it's doing what it's supposed to be doing. This would be fixed with what is called an expansion tank and not necessarily DIY for the average person.
Some of these valves operate on both pressure and temperature, if it's leaking because of temperature you have a faulty electric heater.
The last reason is faulty seal which is the same issue with the test, it is not a necessarily safety issue but requires new valve to fix it.
These valves are very easy to replace and not that expensive.
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