How to Service Your Heating System: Our Top 4 Tips

When’s the last time you serviced your heating system?

Having an efficient heating system in your investment property is extremely important for for obvious reasons — mainly, the safety of your tenants and the health of your wallet. What might not be so obvious is that a forced-air heating system needs to be checked, cleaned, and serviced at least twice per year.

At MerGo Property Management, we service all of our systems twice per year — once before the winter season and once after. Here are our tips on how to keep your heating system in tip-top shape. (This is actually the checklist our maintenance crews use!)

1. Change the air filter

This requires opening the system up and checking to see what filter you need, then buying and installing it. If you find the filter is VERY dirty, then we recommend checking the filter more than twice per year. This is an easy step — a clean air filter is huge.

2. Check all ductwork for holes and kinks

Do this by running the system and walking through your basement checking for any air. The kinks can be found by looking for noticeably less air flow coming out of any of the vents inside your house.

3. Clean the blower fan

This can be done by vacuuming the dust off the fan. If it is extremely dirty and seems to not be working properly, we’d recommend having an HVAC tech take a look.

4. Declutter returns and vents

Always make sure your returns and vents are clean of any debris and furniture! It’s important your system can “breathe easily,” and this is an easy fix to ensure everything will continue to work properly. (You may even want to tell your tenants to not put furniture or debris near these areas!)

If, at any point, you think your heating system is sub-par — always call a professional.

And if you have any questions, MerGo Property Management is always here to answer them. We are your resource for Boston Property Management Services — feel free to get in touch, we’d love to hear from you!