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A house is a smaller building, not a lesser one
Same instruments, same written record. The facility work is the larger half of this business; it is the reason the residential work is careful rather than a reason it is neglected.
The calls we take most
No cooling in a Brazos Valley summer
Diagnosed and priced before anything is fitted, with the repair figure given separately from any replacement figure so you can compare them yourself rather than take one number on trust.
Cold but sticky
A system that satisfies the thermostat quickly never runs long enough to take moisture out. We measure indoor humidity and cycle times before anybody suggests a larger machine, because a larger machine makes this worse.
Water from a drain or a ceiling
Almost always a blocked condensate line rather than a broken machine. Clearing it is routine; a float switch that stops it happening again costs very little and prevents the expensive version.
One room that never settles
Measured, not guessed. Airflow at that register against the others, static pressure, return capacity and the state of the attic run feeding it.
Annual service
Coils, drains proved by pouring water through, filter fit, electrical connections, charge against the manufacturer’s target and combustion testing, with the readings recorded so this year can be compared with last year.
Before you buy, sell or let
What is installed, how old each unit is from its serial number, what condition it is in and what putting it right would realistically cost. In writing, quickly.
The August window applies to houses too
A great deal of the housing here turns over in one month, and that month is the only time a rental is empty, reachable and quiet. It is the cheapest week of the year to do anything properly, and the one almost nobody books.
What is worth doing while it is empty: filter changed and its size written down, condensate drain cleared and proved with a float switch fitted if there is not one, both coils inspected, charge checked against target, and airflow and static pressure measured.
And the part that pays for itself: a dated condition record with photographs, taken while the property is empty. It is the baseline for the next tenancy and it settles every later argument about what state the system was in.
Four things we say to homeowners here
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Set the fan to auto
If your thermostat fan is set to on rather than auto, change it today. It costs nothing, and in this climate it is a common reason a house is cold and still sticky.
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Bigger is worse here, not safer
An oversized system satisfies the thermostat before it has dried anything. In Brazos Valley air that is the difference between comfortable and merely cold.
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Age alone is not a reason to replace
A system that holds its charge, moves the air it should and passes its safety checks works, whatever the year on the label. Age changes the arithmetic on an expensive repair and nothing else.
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A gas appliance with no carbon monoxide alarm is the one urgent item
Everything else on this page can wait for a convenient week. That cannot. Fit one, and have the combustion tested and the heat exchanger inspected.