Air Duct Cleaning in San Anselmo, CA

Frequently Asked Questions

My ducts run through the crawlspace and it smells musty when the heat kicks on. Is that something cleaning fixes?

Sometimes, and sometimes it's a symptom cleaning alone won't solve. On the flat-lot homes down near the creek, crawlspaces take on water, and sheet metal or flex duct sitting in that damp air picks up rust, mildew on the insulation, and a smell that comes through the registers once the furnace runs in October. We clean what's cleanable and tell you plainly when a run is too corroded or the liner too far gone to save. If the crawlspace itself is wet, cleaning the ducts buys you a season at best until the moisture source is handled.

Our house is a 1920s bungalow with the old furnace converted over. Will the ductwork even handle a cleaning?

Usually yes, but it needs a look first. A lot of San Anselmo homes are running oversized trunk lines originally built for a gravity or floor furnace, with a newer blower bolted to the front end and returns that were never enlarged to match. Those big old trunks hold a surprising amount of debris, and the joints are often wrapped in old tape that we treat as suspect until proven otherwise. We don't cut, scrape or disturb tape that looks like it could be asbestos. That's a licensed abatement job, not ours, and we'll stop and tell you rather than work around it.

What makes the price go up or down on a house like mine?

Access drives it more than square footage here. A single-story bungalow with a clean, dry crawlspace and reachable registers is straightforward. What adds time: long gravity-era trunk lines that need to be worked in sections, undersized or hidden returns, hillside homes up in Sleepy Hollow or on the Red Hill slope where the equipment has to be carried up stairs and the crawlspace is a tight wedge, and any run that's rusted or has wet insulation needing extra handling. We walk the system before quoting so the number reflects your actual ductwork, not an average.

How soon can you get out here?

Spring and early fall are our busiest stretches in Ross Valley. Spring because the oak pollen load gets pulled through the returns, fall because everyone fires up heat for the first time since May and notices the smell. In those windows, expect a few days' wait for a standard appointment. Mid-summer, when almost nobody here is running the system, we're usually open within a day or two. We give you an arrival window rather than a vague morning or afternoon, since parking on the narrow lots in town is tight and we'd rather not block a neighbor longer than needed.

Can you come out the same day if the furnace is blowing dust or something smells burnt?

Sometimes, depending on where we are in the valley that day. But be aware that a burning smell on the first cold night of the season is often just dust cooking off the heat exchanger and clears in an hour. If it persists, or you're seeing visible dust pushed out of the registers, that's worth looking at. On the retrofitted systems common here it's often an undersized or leaky return pulling crawlspace air straight into the blower. Call and describe what you're seeing; if it reads as a safety issue rather than a cleaning issue, we'll tell you to get an HVAC tech out first.