Should I Be Present For Diagnostics & Repairs?

Question

Deanna McCormick · Answer

I'd go and see for myself first. If it's forced air could be a damper closed down in basement that just needs to be switched open or.. honestly could be they are so stupid they don't know the room vent needs to be pushed open... or they think a cold air return is a heat vent....

Check it out yourself first..

Mark Langdon · Answer

Yes; go look at it first as this is your house. If its the vent then its something simple like a damper is closed or its been that way all along or other dampers got opened up which you may have to close partially to force the air up the that room. For best results; the more you know about your home and the way it works the better. You may easily be able to save the HVAC service call if its something simple. If not you will learn what it was and know for the future. If you just call a HVAC service person you are leaving it up to them to decide. You should be there with the HVAC service person if you can. If not then you just have to rely on their word but make them call you before they do the actual repair to get a feel for what it is and how much it will cost to give them the approval. If they come back with something very expensive you can say; please wait and let me look into it further. Now if you want to be totally hands off and don't care what it is and don't mind paying the bill so you are not bothered and can do other more productive items; you can do that obviously also. It really depends on you and how you go about managing your properties and how much you want to be involved.

Jim Adrian · Answer

Go see this first hand and see if you can trouble shoot it first.  Then call the hvac company.  Be present for the diagnostics as you may need to make decisions on your system.   Don't let the tenant make decisions on your system, bad things can happen and its your money.  I suggest having a yearly contract with them to come clean the units in spring and fall should run under $200 for the year.

Gail K. · Answer

Same thing happened to one of our SFH's.  I very much trust our HVAC guy but show up for the repairs as much as I can (if nothing else I can write Ed a check for the repairs right then).

In this case it was a good thing I did.  Turns out the tenants dog has chewed open the door to the crawl space under the house, crawled under there, pulled down the duct pipe leading to the vent the tenant was complaining about.   The charge to repair this came out of his security deposit.

Gail

Should I Be Present For Diagnostics & Repairs?

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