High humidity in a home is bad as it creates mold problems, dust mite problems, and things like that, especially, if you’re talking about air duct cleaning. Imagine, if you’ve got an air duct full of dust and then you’ve got high humidity in the house and that dust in the ducts can grow mold and can also be dust mite colony food sources, which is why this topic is so important. 

How Often Should I Get My Ducts Cleaned? 

Now, this is a pretty standard answer across the internet, they say about every three to five years minimum but if your ducts are sealed well, you don’t have to get them cleaned as often. If you use a great filter you don’t have to get them clean as often. If you change your filter regularly you don’t have to get them as clean as often but some of the things that may actually make it more time-wise, getting your filter and your ducts cleaned more rapidly or more often would be: 

⇒ If you live in an older home.

⇒ If you live in a house where it’s got a lot of drafts and allows a lot of outdoor air into the home. 

⇒ If you got a leaky attic that’s not air sealed 

⇒ If you live on a gravel road – believe it or not that’s something that can cause problems. 

⇒ If you have pets, especially birds, guinea pigs, cats, and things that shed or have dander, those can be problems for people. 

⇒ If you have a respiratory problem, perhaps a COPD sufferer.

⇒ If you’re a smoker.

⇒ If you have a lot of allergies or you just have a regular problem with dust. Carpeted homes tend to hold more dust than homes with hard floors or tiles. 

⇒ Whether you keep your home closed up more often trying to condition that air versus living in a part of the country where you keep your windows open more often. 

These are all factors describing whether you should get your air ducts cleaned more often or not. 

Signs I Need My Ducts Cleaned

• Visible Dust in the Ducts
• Increase in Dust in Your Home
• Dust Around the Registers
• Increase in Allergy Symptoms
• Increase in Respiratory Discomfort

If you walk into your house and you feel worse being inside of the house, than you do, maybe, at work or at school, that could be an indication of not only a dirty duct but you could have other air quality issues like VOCs or mold problems. So, just to remember, you’re supposed to feel better in your home than you are in other places. You spend more time inside your house typically than you do any other place out in the world, especially in your bedroom. If you’re getting your eight hours of sleep, your bedroom is going to be your biggest sanctuary room in the house. 

Can Flex Ducts be Cleaned?

We do have special equipment with soft brushes that are able to clean flex ductwork. Believe it or not, most companies don’t use this type of technology and they can damage ductwork. 

Is it foolproof that you can never damage ductwork with Flex duct brushes? No, you can have old brittle ductwork that’s been around since the build of the house and you built your house in the 70s of course, it could get damaged but for the most part, we have the ability to take care of those damaged ducts.

One of the things we encourage you to do if you’re serious about your air quality is not only to get the ducts cleaned but to get them sealed. The nice thing about that is you can get the ducts cleaned and get them sealed. Chances are you may not have to have the ducts cleaned at all, especially not as often and if there is a puncture or a small cut in your flex ductwork, our sealing capability is going to be able to seal that as the duct cleaning. 

Other Ways to Improve Your Air Quality

⇒ Seal Ducts

To improve the air quality, you should seal the ductwork and make sure that it’s done properly.

⇒ Use Great Furnace Filters and Change Them Often

If you’re using a disposable filter, you want to change it every thirty days. If you got a really dusty house, change them every 90 days.

⇒ Use Air Purifier

If you don’t change using air purification technology, that ionizes the air. Now, that’s important because ionization is the ability to clump dust particles together to make them larger so that filtration can capture more particles. It also makes them heavy enough to drop out of your breathing zones, so that you can get them off of the floor, either through vacuuming or some other ways of cleaning the floor.

⇒ Air Seal Attic

Make sure it’s encapsulated and humidity is controlled as well as air seal your attic because a lot of what’s in the attic is going to come down inside of the house if it’s not properly air sealed and then of course if your ductwork is running through your attic or your crawlspace and they are dirty and if they’re not sealed properly they’re gonna pick up more of that dust that we talked about earlier. 

The Benefits of Air Duct Cleaning

Some of the things that it removes are:

• If you’ve got dead things inside your ductwork, you want to make sure you get those things out.
• It’s also going to remove irritants and allergens and years and years of dust buildup. 
• It does improve your living space and makes the air cleaner inside the home.
• It gives you peace of mind and controls odors as well.