Did you know that the air in your home is not as clean as you may think it is? The cause of this may surprise you. Your air ducts, used in your heating and cooling systems, can actually become one of the biggest sources of dust and filth in your home if not regularly cleaned, and remember, they’re ventilating that impure air throughout your entire house. Not cleaning your air ducts is pretty much the equivalent of sweeping your home and then tossing all the dirt back onto one of the carpets.
Reasons You Should Regularly Clean Your Ducts
Keeping your air ducts clean is the best way to keep the air in your home pure and fresh, but if you’re not yet sold on the idea of going to that extra effort, let’s list seven reasons that you should be.
- Dust Accumulates - In one year, the average family generates nearly forty pounds worth of dust annually. This doesn’t even take into account the pet hair, mold, and dust that blows in through your open windows. Not cleaning your air ducts means that most of this dirt doesn’t leave your home and remains in constant circulation throughout it, proving hellish to someone who suffers from allergies. Cleaning your air ducts makes the air healthier, and in addition to helping alleviate allergies, it will help to prevent you from developing respiratory illnesses such as asthma.
- Rats - Rats and other vermin love inhabiting dirty areas. Your dirty air ducts may look like a prime piece of real estate to a rat and having such an infestation could cause your air quality to plummet. Not only will they cause strong odors, but also their fur and droppings can cause allergic reactions and contaminate your food. This is not even to mention that, when they die in your air ducts, they become a stench-ridden haven of bacteria and viruses. Cleaning out your pipes regularly is the best way to prevent you from having to share your home with any unwanted vermin.
- Bugs - Your air ducts can harbor dozens of unwanted creepy crawlies, especially during the winter months. There’s the possibility of attracting spiders, some of which are venomous, mosquitoes, millipedes, and the dreaded giant moth. For the most part, the worst these things can do is give you an unpleasant surprise when you see them crawling out of the woodwork, but that really doesn’t mean we want them in our homes. Another important note is that when there are many insects living in such a place, you’re likely to also attract lizards that prey on them, and if the problem gets worse… well, there’s always the chance that you’re going to attract a snake with an appetite for lizards.
- A Lot of People Don't Clean Their Air Ducts, Including the People You Bought Your House From - Chances are, you’ve never thought about cleaning your air ducts. This is also true of the people who’ve lived in your house before you. This means that you’re not just breathing in the contaminants that have built up since you moved in, but also the collective build-up over dozens of strangers as well. You could be very well inhaling remnants of grime and muck that are decades old. This includes bacteria that infected them during their lifetime, which could very well now be infecting you.
- Mold - Many of us are no stranger to dealing with outbreaks of mold in our homes, particularly in our basements and attics. Whilst this is most common in damp, humid areas, it can occur almost anywhere, but there’s one thing many of us don’t consider. Simply getting rid of mold isn’t going to fix the problem due to the fact that the spores have probably already made their way into your air ducts. This could lead to outbreaks of mold throughout the home and in the ducts themselves, meaning that you could be breathing in these spores without even realizing it.
- Keeping Your Home Clean Will Be Impossible - Dust likes to settle. Yes, it may spend ages floating through the air, but it will settle eventually. When your ducts are not properly cleaned, this means that there is a lot more dust in the air that’s going to settle on your floors, walls, and furnishings. This is going to ensure that your stuff is almost always covered in a coating of dust and other impurities, meaning that the cleaning is never going to end.
- The Filters In Your Ducts Function Similarly to Your Lungs - It’s common knowledge that breathing in second-hand smoke is harmful to your body. Well, consider that your lungs never properly lose all of the impurities that gather in them when you smoke, and remember that the filters in your air ducts work in much the same way. Without knowing it, you could be inhaling second-hand tobacco smoke for weeks after the actual offending cigarette has been snuffed out because the residual smoke that’s caught in your air ducts remains there for a long, long time.
Duct Cleaning is Part of Home Maintenance
Cleaning your air ducts isn’t something that most homeowners consider as part of their regular home maintenance routine, but by engaging in proper maintenance, you can ensure that you and your family enjoy cleaner air and a healthier lifestyle.
Call Fresh Aire Duct Cleaning at (818) 275-5556 or contact us online to learn more about our duct cleaning services in Los Angeles and Glendale.