Upgrading your furnace

The Benefits of Upgrading to a Modern Furnace

Waking up to no heat can be a confusing process. The need for heat is primal for Canadians, like the need for food or social belonging. As we walk across the cold floor from our bed to the thermostat in confusion, many thoughts go through our heads. “How much will this cost, and how long will it take out of my busy life to deal with?” are the most common. Calgarians are busy people, and taking time to fix a furnace can mean lost wages if a technician is not accurate or skilled. As we look at the thermostat and confirm that the house temperature is well below what we are requesting from our furnace, it is likely that we are wishing this would all just go away. Often, when this happens to you, it has happened to thousands of others subject to the same cold snap. Many companies will tell you they cannot get to you for days. If you are stuck without heat and are told that no one is willing to come to help you, it is not at all uncommon to experience panic.

At this point, you will need a technician. What we offer at the Gentlemen Pros is nothing less than some of the best technicians in the industry. We will arrive promptly, are clean, and are drug and background tested. When you strive to be the best, you are under pressure to offer high-quality service that our customers see the value in and are satisfied with, so that our reputation continues as one of the best. We don’t sell; we educate, we don’t prescribe; we provide options, and we respect your choices. 

Being without a technician at a busy time in the industry when you desperately need heat back on in your home is an impossible scenario to fix in the moment it occurs. This is a problem that must be addressed ahead of time and prepared for. If you are at that point and you do not have a family member or friend to drop everything and help you, consider securing a membership with The Gentlemen Pros that offers front-of-the-line service to its members.

What you can expect from The Gentlemen Pros is this: you will never pay a cost that you do not agree to. We will arrive and perform a diagnostic that will give us definitive answers on what needs to be done to restore your heat. You will have a repair option, and, if relevant, a replacement option. New furnaces are designed to save money on fuel, and this fuel efficiency makes them cheaper to run in the long term. You can waste a lot of money and time repairing an old, inefficient furnace. If our technicians feel it would be a mistake to repair your old furnace, they will let you know. There is a very clear mathematical method to figure this out, and you will be included in it. If you feel that repair is the best option, we offer a five-year parts and labor warranty on the component and a discount on repairs for members.

How could a modern furnace be less expensive than an old furnace? Fuel efficiency. Every furnace has a BTU rating, which stands for British Thermal Unit and is a way of measuring the heat provided by a furnace extracted from the burning of fuel. Every furnace has both an input and an output. A common modern furnace is 98 percent efficient, so a 100,000 BTU furnace puts out 98,000 BTUs of heat. In that case, you are only losing 2 cents on every dollar while heating your home. A common furnace from the 1970s has an efficiency of 65 percent when brand new and has lost an efficiency percentile for every year since it was installed. That is the case even if the furnace has been cleaned and tuned up every single year. That means your reliable ancient furnace from the 1970s, 1980s, or even mid-efficiency furnaces from the 1990s is potentially providing less than 50 cents out of every dollar spent on heating your home. Imagine saving close to 50 percent on your home heating bill by installing a new furnace!

Should I replace a broken old furnace with a new one considering this reality? Often in the field as a technician, clients tell me that they do not wish to replace a 20 or even 50-year-old furnace because of its reliability, ironically even as I am there to repair it. Older furnaces come from a completely different time and way of life. They burn extreme amounts of fuel. Ultimately, only you will know what is best for you concerning this option. What we can offer you is all the information needed to make an informed choice.