A/C Repair or replace? SEER 12 or 19? A/C or Heat Pump?
Have you ever studied up on something, and the more information you got, the more confused you became? That's where I am on an air conditioning problem I have. Here's the story:
We recently bought an eleven year old home we plan to stay in the rest of our lives (20 years or more). This past weekend, the A/C (11 year old, 5 ton Trane SEER 12) developed a major leak in the A-coil (once filled, it stops working within six hours). I've had two companies look at it, and here's what they tell me:
Replace the A-coil for $1500. It fixes the problem, but does it make sense to spend $1500 on a 11 year old system. The A/C guy says that if I need to replace the outside unit later it will be compatible.
Replace the whole A/C unit for $4300 for a SEER 13 unit. While that gives a little better efficiency, it's not a lot, and it's just an A/C unit, not a heat pump. If I'm going to spend that much money, why not go for a heat pump?
Replace the unit with a SEER 13 heat pump for $5300. A heat pump which will help in winter (I currently heat with propane), but a SEER 13 isn't real efficient, and not a lot more efficient than my current A/C that I can just repair for only $1500.
Go for a truly high efficient heat pump (SEER 19). The cost there goes up a lot (to about $9000). If the payback really there?
Or for only ~$13,000 I could go with a SEER 19 ground source unit. Really efficient, but there's a big difference between $1,500 and $13,000.
A little more information: I'm in the KC area, so it can get cold here in the winter and hot in the summer, but electricity is pretty cheap.. . Around 0.07/kwh.
Any suggestions would be nice to have at this point.
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