Installing Central Air Conditioning
It goes without saying that our house is a fixer. It’s been a labor of love and we’re slowly wrapping up the interior house projects (jk, it never ends). And so it was finally time to invest in central air conditioning. And like always, it had its fair share of surprises and big decisions.
When we bought the house, it didn’t have a gas line or central AC. For the past two years, we’ve been relying on fans, a semi-broken portable AC unit, and opening the windows. But now with a newborn, temperature regulation is a must.
Alex did his due diligence and got quotes from about 5 different installers. Ultimately, he decided on Southland for its highly rated reviews. However, it wasn’t as simple as going in and installing air conditioning. Since our house has a flat roof, it made things more challenging because there is no attic to hide the ducts. Which meant that if we wanted central AC, we’d have to place the HVAC system on top of the roof in a spot that could bear its weight, and then cut directly through the roof to connect the ducts into each room. The process would be invasive and aesthetically less pleasing. In fact, every installer warned that you would see the “elephant trunk” ducts on top of our roof and significantly impact our curb appeal.
The alternative was to install ductless mini splits in each room. Less invasive and more flexible, these individual units could be placed throughout the house with no impact to our roof. However, temperature regulation would be more difficult and we’d still have to install about a dozen throughout the house for the same price..
Alex and I weighed the pros and cons, and though we ran the risk of it looking ugly, we really wanted to have the reliability (and added resale value) of central AC. We initially scheduled to have the installation done before the baby arrived, but it rained on the dates we had planned so we postponed the project for 2 months.
To prep for the installation, I moved the furniture around in each room and covered it with painters plastic. Since we had done multiple walkthroughs prior, I knew generally where they would be cutting each vent. I wanted to make it as easy as possible for them to reach the specific wall or ceiling, and I wanted to minimize the amount of dust that would inevitably get on our furniture and things. Luckily, there wasn’t as much sawdust as I thought there would be, and the guys also added another layer of plastic on top of mine.
The job took 2 full days to complete so we spent the day at Alex’s mom’s house with the dogs. The guys started in the living room and kitchen on the first day, so we were able to come home at night, pull back the plastic, and sleep in our own bed. After they did the bedrooms on the second day, they carefully snaked the ducts very low to the roof so that it’s barely visible from the street. The HVAC now sits towards the back of the house on top of a bearing wall above the living room that can hold its weight. We were so impressed with their attention to detail and really appreciated their extra efforts to keep our house looking pretty.
The guys worked until 9pm on the second day to wrap everything up, vacuum, set up our Nest thermostat, and test both the AC and heat. It was a process and we had to make some last-minute changes to the vent placements, but in the end, we’re so happy with the results despite everyone scaring us into thinking we’d ruin our roof. A tiny part of me is a little sad that there are cutouts in our wood ceiling, but it’s a small price to pay for the luxury of central AC.