ERS Residential Cooling

Residential Heating

How do you make sense of the almost endless furnace options available? You call ERS, the expert you trust. Here are some of the options you will see in furnaces that range from approximately $1,400 to more than $4,000.

Size matters in furnaces, but not how you think. You don’t want a furnace that is too large. An over-sized furnace will cycle up to three times per hour and only heat the air in the home. A properly sized furnace will run for about 30 minutes to an hour and heat everything in your home, not just the air. Cycling is less efficient as each time the furnace starts it takes extra electricity and natural gas to get going.

A low-cost furnace does have a lower upfront cost, but that is offset with a higher monthly cost. These are approximately 55% to 72% efficient. A more expensive furnace is the opposite, more upfront but less per month to operate. These are generally about 95-98% efficient.

There are also single stage, two-stage and modulating furnaces. This refers to the valves that put gas into the furnace. A single-stage furnace has one valve and it always operates at 100%, a two-stage furnace has a valve that operates at 70% or at 100% while a modulating furnace has a valve that runs between 40-100% in .5% increments. The most efficient is the modulating valve.

Most furnaces come with a 10-year warranty and will generally last at least 15 years. The most important cost is not the initial cost, it is the overall cost of ownership over those 15 years. A more efficient furnace will save you 15-20% per month in natural gas and electricity use over a lesser furnace. Over the course of 15 years you will save approximately $200 per year or about $3,000 total. You save more if you properly maintain the furnace so that it lasts longer.

Look more at total cost, not just the upfront cost, and call ERS to determine the correct size furnace for your home.