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Kudos to all you who are repairing your old ones! I think i might be making a mistake for resale, but I love my old windows and am working diligently to reglaze and repaint all 29 of them! Also replacing with new storms since the old ones are broken. IMHO, there are very few out there that can look like the old ones do. Although I do understand in some situations where rot occurs its not as feasible to repair, but I lucked out. So far no rot, just lots of scraping, glaze and paint (and patience)!!!!
I did look into replacing. The only ones that came close to the look I wanted and seemed decent were marvin, but the cost for 29 windows scared me away.
I don't know your location, but if you're replacing your windows to save energy you should probably put your money elsewhere. Replacing windows for energy savings is very rarely cost-effective, and the fact that there are many more cost-effective investments just makes this even clearer.
I don't know your location, but if you're replacing your windows to save energy you should probably put your money elsewhere. Replacing windows for energy savings is very rarely cost-effective, and the fact that there are many more cost-effective investments just makes this even clearer.
If you're selling, go with ANY thermal window..if not, a GOOD window will save you AT LEAST 50 percent a YEAR on heating AND cooling!!!
You want to be very careful. Selling new windows is big big business. They make a lot of profit on a big window job. Many companies will try to oversell to you, get you to spend more than you really need to, or give you something that you do not want.
Windows heavily dictate the look of your house. I have seen many many houses end up looking absolutely terrible by changing windows. Make sure you match the arcitectural style of your house and consider what vinyl especially cheap vinyl will look like. We spend thoudands of dollars and hundreds of hours a year trying to make our houses look nice outside. You do nto want to ruin the look by getting cruddy windows becuase you think it will save a couple of hundred dollars a year in heating and cooling costs. Windows are where you also lose a lot of heat/cooling.
We looked into replacing all of our windows and decided that it woudl be better to just repair the existing ones (we have a historic house and preserving the historic integrity also weighed heavily into the equation). We decided that we wanted roughly ten windows made. We wanted wood windows to match the look of our historic house. We were going to use the Marvin Ultimate Double Hung windows because they are a decent match to existing. OUr contractor talked us into using a little local guy. Here was the result:
The first set of winddows were all wrong, nothing was the right size, There were too many of some kinds of windows and none of another type that they were supposed to supply. They obviously sent us an order for someone else's house.
The next batch was mostly right. Some were the wrong size and had to be replaced. Some were missing parts. Seveal had Muntins glues on which I had specifically forbidden. The glue let go and some of them fell off after about a week. By this time, the windows were already installed and the cost of removing them wass too high so we have to just have them re-glued and live with them unhappily.
Ultimately they were installed. Within a year, most of them had the mechanisms that allow them to open and stay open fall apart. The first winter, I discovered that they forgot to put weatherstripping in although they left a gap for weatherstripping.
By this time, the window company had disappered. They went out of business and left no forwarding addtress. The cost of tearing out the windows and replacing them will far exceed the original purchase price. However since we are stuck paying for it, we have nto been able to do it.
A coule of lessons that we learned from doing this and from our research:
1. Use a big well established company if possible.
2. Get a warranty bond if possible (it should only add about 2% to the price).
3. Vinyl windows are nto better than wood, they are just easier to maintain. However, propertly painted wood windows will only require paint every ten or so years.
4. You lose a lot of heat through your windows. You can pay a fortune and still lose a lot of heat through your windows. Although double pane, gas filled etc, will double or even triple the R value of your windows, it really is not that much of an improvement. Going from a window R value of 1 to and R value of 4 is nto going to make a huge bifference in heating bills. You are still losing a lot of heat through the windows. Do the math, or have someone who is nto trying to sell you windows do it for you. The cost of replacing the windows will not be recpatured for a long long time. (For us if we replaced all the windows, it was about 30 years). There are better places to spend less money with better results. (Like attic insulation, storm doors, etc).
The conventional wisdom is that replacing the windows is the best and most economical way to save money on heating and cooling costs. OUr research indicated that this is completely untrue. It is hugely expensive, with only limited savings. If you are losing a lot of heat through your windows they are probably leaking, just get that fixed). Things like LowE or whatever it is glass that costs a fortune will never return the cost. So why is it common belief that replacing windows is economically sound? Go back to the point that there is a lot of profit in windows.
Many (most? All?) gas filled windows eventually leak. That means that you lose the added R value that you paid for and the windows will fog up between panes of glass. Also, if dust gets in there, you cannot get it out.
Vinyl will eventually decay, become brittle and need replacing. Newer vinyl compounds last longer, expecially the more expensive types. Be careful about cheap vinyl windows, they may decay quickly.
Do not take anyone's word for any of this. Do your own research. Consider the source of everything that you find. Do the math and double check the logic. A huge marketing effort has been underway for decades. Many experts will tell you that replacement windows are the only way to go, but when you dig into the basis for this, you may well find that there is none. Do not take my word for it, or anyone else's, dig into it and make your own conclusions. When you do look into it, watch out for window sellers calculations. We found that some of them will take the R value difference and apply it to the entire footage of your house, rather than just the windows. IF you get a calcualtion that shows a monumental savings every year, be suspiciuous and look at it carefully. For our house, the potential savings was pretty small on a yearly basis, especially when ccompared with the cost.
Ultimately, we decided to repair the old windows in our house and buy only the new windows that were being added. We had to old ones re-done and used storm windows rather than replacing the windows. (With storms, the R-value difference is reduced to almost nothing). The only real problem that we have is the new windows and one old windows that we did nto get to.
Anyway, all said and done, if you are goinjg to rpelace your windows, take a good look at Marvin. That is whom I wish that we had used.
Wood swells and contract...there is a HUGE difference in vinyl and wood!!!! WOWWWW!! LMAO
If you're selling, go with ANY thermal window..if not, a GOOD window will save you AT LEAST 50 percent a YEAR on heating AND cooling!!!
Do you have economic and engineering studies to back that up?
I am on the advisory board of our statewide energy efficiency utility, and they do not recommend replacement of windows as an efficiency measure. Simply put, study after study has shown that the small increases in energy efficiency cannot justify the high price of replacement windows.
Weatherstripping and other air sealing measures are a different story entirely.
If you're selling, go with ANY thermal window..if not, a GOOD window will save you AT LEAST 50 percent a YEAR on heating AND cooling!!!
We replaced all of our (cheap, metal framed) windows and patio doors with the best we could find and also resided our home with insulated siding in 2006. Cost was about $33,000. Our heating bills have not gone down at all. (Although they might have gone up a little more had we not done it.) Unless you live in a greenhouse with single-pane windows, I don't believe your 50% figure. I **might** believe 5%.
We replaced all of our (cheap, metal framed) windows and patio doors with the best we could find and also resided our home with insulated siding in 2006. Cost was about $33,000. Our heating bills have not gone down at all. (Although they might have gone up a little more had we not done it.) Unless you live in a greenhouse with single-pane windows, I don't believe your 50% figure. I **might** believe 5%.
I don't know about saving 50%... that definitely sounds high.
But, it is a fact that heating costs have gone up -- dramatically -- in the last couple of years.
Where I live, the budget amount on my utilities has gone up about 35 % in less than 2 years. It's been a cool summer and I didn't use the a/c much either year... but, my bill keeps going up.
It would be interesting to know how much your heating bills would be if you hadn't done the work you did. They usually have those charts that show usage compared from last year to the current year. I'm going to be watching for the next one of those.
I have never seen anything that indicates that replacing windows is a way to save money. Window sellers try to tout this concept, but for the cost of windows, you can do an awful lot more by improving insulation and reducing air infiltration. Every actauly study that I have ever seen arrived at the same conclusion mentioned above. While you get some improvement from replacing windows, it is inconsequential.
I beleive that this whole "replace your windows" thing is a scam. You cna always pick out the scams because they want both spouses pretent for a "presentation" rather than just giving you a price. Can you imagine the concrete guy insisting that you both be present for a presentaiton about concrete? Like the people who come to your house to sell you water treatmenet equipment, I do nto trust window sellers at all unless they simply stay in their store and let you come and tell them that you need new windows. Not the toehr way around. Companies that use hard sell techniques do so becuase they atand to make huge profits and becuase they know that if you think it through, you will do something else.
Kudos to all you who are repairing your old ones! I think i might be making a mistake for resale, but I love my old windows and am working diligently to reglaze and repaint all 29 of them! Also replacing with new storms since the old ones are broken. IMHO, there are very few out there that can look like the old ones do. Although I do understand in some situations where rot occurs its not as feasible to repair, but I lucked out. So far no rot, just lots of scraping, glaze and paint (and patience)!!!!
I did look into replacing. The only ones that came close to the look I wanted and seemed decent were marvin, but the cost for 29 windows scared me away.
A lot more people are seeing the old windows for what they are and replacements are a turn off, it all depends on the buyer. Our smallish 100 year old house has original windows and that is part of her charm. We will be sealing, reglazing as necessary and making new wooden storm windows.
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