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We just replaced our 22 year old Rheems unit. It had a leak and it was cheaper to get a new one.
We had 3 bids for a 16 seer: Goodman $5000, Lennox $11,000 or Ruud $3600. I comparison shopped since we had a Trane at our other house that is still going strong at 21 years, and then the Rheems at our current house is 22 years old. We went with the Ruud and we're very happy with it. Time will tell I guess, but the reviews are really good.
Goodman should be the cheapest unit on the retail market. The great variance shows the difference in what contractors charge.
I have a buddy that sold his HVAC company to one of the big HVAC manufacturers. He says that makers have gone through many large cities buying HVAC contractors and hiring them to run their old businesses. Of course the new owners call the shots--including pricing.
I have a father and son, one truck, HVAC contractor doing my work. And I have a 24 year old Trane heat pump in my lake house--that doesn't run all the time. The A Coil went out, and a Trane part was $1,300--just for the coil. Trane thinks a lot of their parts--costs are sky high.
FWIW our Trane XR14 2-ton unit (and matching air handler) can maintain 67 degrees (and even lower, I imagine, because it still cycles off) during 100-degree outside temps. This is the smallest unit of the lineup, and their entry level model across the available options. The smallest and cheapest. Period.
While we're only cooling 1000 SF, the home has the bare minimum insulation for its time period (1988) and original windows. I've done my fair share of window shopping at the beach, and it seems I see nothing BUT Carrier units in old and new builds. But Trane, for us, has been 100% brute force and muscle when everyone else complains their house won't get below 78 degrees inside.
They're probably the loudest units I've stood next to, but if you're not particularly sensitive, go with the XR14 and the scroll compressor. If you NEED a quiet unit, step it up to something known for lower noise levels.
That's a huge variation. Can't believe Lennox was that much.
Lennox is one of Costco's service providers. I had them out to see how much they would be, pretty much knowing that it would be inflated. The final price was AFTER the 2% cash back and using the Citibank card. So it was over $12,000. My contractor looked at their bid and noted a few unnecessary items like new redwoods. We have a flat roof and the redwoods are perfectly fine. We did have another bid of $7300. That one was for a Reems. Amazing the variance in bid amounts.
I went with Amana for my home and a rental. Great price, zero issues from the last one up until it was 16 years old and leaking, replaced whole system. It was much cheaper, talking thousands, than a Lennox. Miami for reference where the thing runs year round.
When I was contemplating replacing my 1996 HVAC unit, recently, Intelligent Designs recommended Amana as the best of the best, and told me that Lennox was too unreliable, they were spending too much time repairing them in the summer.
I eventually went with a Duct-free Mini-split, supplemented with 2 Room A/C's.
$8k for the Amana and $2k for duct work. The Mini-split $4.5k and 2 Room A/C's less than $500.
Lennox is one of Costco's service providers. I had them out to see how much they would be, pretty much knowing that it would be inflated. The final price was AFTER the 2% cash back and using the Citibank card. So it was over $12,000. My contractor looked at their bid and noted a few unnecessary items like new redwoods. We have a flat roof and the redwoods are perfectly fine. We did have another bid of $7300. That one was for a Reems. Amazing the variance in bid amounts.
I see that Lennox representative there at Costco every time I go and I’ve never been interested in getting a quote from them. After researching Lennox I knew I didn’t want to buy one.
We won't buy anything like this from Costco. I learned that lesson with our Amarr garage doors last year. Quote started out at $8,200. I applied the rule of 3, and gave that company a chance to beat. We ended up at $4,000 and with higher grade Amarr doors than we were initially talking about that they originally quoted $8,200 for. Same for this AC unit we're now replacing (more on that below). Two years ago, had the Costco guy come out to take a look. Nearly $13k for everything on that specific unit (also, Lennox).
We just singed up for a new Trane XR14 3ton, new trane gas furnace (80% efficiency), new coil, new blower, basically new everything top to bottom. Existing coolant lines will remain as they support a 3 ton unit with ability to convert over to the 410 coolant (we're r22 now). All-in...... $7,450. Two year warranty on labor, 10 year warranty on parts.
The other unit we're keeping, also a trane but branded American Standard, is a 2006 and flawless.
On the Carrier vs Trane topic - I was told that the entry level Trane XR14 (which is what we're getting) has the same heavy duty parts as those in the series with higher SEER ratings. I was told that for Carrier to match the Trane, it would have to be a slightly higher end model of Carrier. When you get into the 18 SEER altitude, the two are basically Honda vs Toyota. But in the lower end, it's not quite the same comparison.
We had rheem installed and our bills are cheaper than they previously were. Strange thing is we had rheem replaced with rheem but it was 15 years old time of fire. Usually our bill is around 200.00 in June it was 140. In May it was normally 160.00 it was 100.00. So we will see as time goes on. We actually have 2 air conditioners both are rheem, 1 for up one for down.
Our Trane unit lasted 7 years. It developed pinholes in the condenser coil which allowed Freon to leak. We decided to replace it and found out that all 3 of the largest HVAC companies in our area no longer even sell Trane because they were losing money having to replace entire units they had warranted for 10 years. Maybe their products have gotten better in the 3 years since we replaced our unit. I would do some research and proceed with caution.
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