Have you heard that duct cleaning is something your home needs on a regular basis? The good news is that not every home needs to have its ductwork cleaned, especially if its HVAC system gets annual professional maintenance and air filters are kept clean. So how do you decide whether it’s time for a duct cleaning?

The best answer is to have your ducts inspected by a trained professional with the know-how and specialized tools and gauges to do the job right. With a bit of knowledge, you can have a pretty good idea yourself of whether your home’s ducts are dirty. Look for these specific signs.

Signs of Dirty Ducts

• If you see mold on, near or inside ducts, they probably need to be cleaned. More often than not, if mold is growing at one spot in your ductwork, it’s growing in other places where you can’t see it.
• If dust is blowing out of supply vents and registers, it’s got to be coming from somewhere, and that somewhere is your ductwork. If you see dust bunnies near return registers, however, that’s relatively normal, and it doesn’t necessarily reflect badly on your ducts.
• If you see, smell or hear signs of insects or rodents in your ducts, the ductwork needs to be cleaned. This can be the sound of small footsteps, the smell of rodent dung, visual sightings of nests or scat, or actual sightings of critters in the ducts.

If you see one or more of these telltale signs of dirty ducts, contact a professional HVAC contractor and set up a duct inspection. It’s good to get ductwork checked out routinely every two or three years; simplify it and make it part of your annual HVAC tune-up for that year.

For more information on a duct cleaning in your Columbia area home, check out Cool Care Heating & Air’s indoor air quality solutions, or call (803) 772-7715.