We always strive to provide homeowners across the country with quality indoor air, or Healthy Air, as we lovingly refer to it! But before the right solutions are installed, it’s important to understand what’s really living inside your home. AprilAire Healthy Air Professional and President of HVAC company Luxury Heating Company Paul Samek shares everything you need to know to obtain quality indoor air and reap the many life-changing benefits of Healthy Air!

Getting to Know Paul Samek’s HVAC Company

In chatting with Paul, he shared that he is “among the third generation at Luxury Heating Company,” and gave some insight into their HVAC company mission, “We primarily offer HVAC and Indoor Air Quality solutions for residential and light commercial applications. While we’re an old company, we’re still very much evolving as we become more diverse and bring on new services that make sense for our business. With this evolution has come this increased awareness about Indoor Air Quality systems. A portion of our business, about 35–40%, is still new construction, which is nice because we have an opportunity to actually talk to the homebuilders and the clients.”

His Secret to Maintaining Quality Indoor Air

Old vs. New: HVAC Systems That Produce Quality Indoor Air

With so many people buying homes these days, new homeowners may not know the true differences between conventional HVAC systems and how upgrading to AprilAire can help provide quality indoor air year-round. Thankfully, HVAC company president, Paul shares his perspective.

“Whether it’s a new home or even an older home, your most standard HVAC systems have that one-inch, horsehair-style filter that doesn’t really filter air properly. We will explain to customers that all a one-inch filter is really doing is protecting the equipment from big particles circulating throughout the house and throughout your duct system. Now there’s also the 3M filters: one-inch filters that are like sticking a sheet of glass in there, so those are what I would consider within the standard HVAC system. Another part of having the standard system is that the fan only runs when the system is in heating or cooling mode. Any homeowners that have allergies or asthma know that they typically are the worst in the spring or in the fall when your system is running the least.”

“With a new HVAC system, whether it’s a gas furnace or an electric air handler, most have a true ECM motor that is going to continuously be filtering the air, regardless of whether it’s heating or cooling or not.” By introducing an AprilAire Healthy Air System®, Paul explains, “it’s going to not only continuously be moving the air throughout the house and throughout the system, but it’s also going to be cleaning it—not just recycling it. You’re not only bringing that fresh air in to help make quality indoor air that’s much healthier, but you’re also filtering it.”

“A standard system is just recycling,” Paul reiterates. “A new, modern HVAC system that we can incorporate an AprilAire Whole-House Ventilation System into will help homeowners feel much better and it’s going to be a much cleaner environment inside.”

Signs Your System Needs an Upgrade

How can homeowners audit their current systems and decide if an upgrade is needed to achieve quality indoor air? Paul gives us helpful insights.

“For anyone that is not mechanically inclined or doesn’t have any type of trade or mechanical background, it’s hard for them to conduct their own audit. A lot of times, customers think they have a ventilation system because they have that duct that is just sitting in the basement. But to be able to identify it on your own is tricky.”

“One of the benefits of having your system serviced,” Paul interjects, “is that you can have the conversation with the service technician to be able to say, ‘Do I have one? How does it work? Where is it located?’ We like to try and help our customers as much as we can, but that’s one that I think would be hard for them to truly be able to identify or help them identify over the phone because of all the ductwork.”

“As far as signs of needing an upgrade—on the ventilation side, moisture is probably one of the biggest things that would come to mind. When homeowners start to see condensation on the ductwork or see the ductwork sweat, they should consider upgrading it to a ventilation system that’s more controlled versus just bringing in air. Regardless of the outdoor temperature and humidity, one of the key things is to eliminate and reduce the number of unintended consequences of a ventilation system. So, I’d say moisture is one of those things that you can see that’s telling you that you need something better.”

“I don’t think it’s any surprise to a customer when we bring up air filtration—so, the concept of having the filtration and air purification in whatever capacity that might be is important,” Paul offers when we ask why these solutions are necessary in every home. He continues, “[a customer] understands very easily the difference in upgrading from a one-inch filter to a media air filtration system.”

“When it comes to ventilation,” Paul says, “that’s a much bigger conversation. These houses are built so tight today. We have more and more builders that we are working with that are building these ENERGY STAR® homes. So, it’s an airtight house and with our cold climate, we don’t open the windows. Natural ventilation isn’t sufficient anymore because you don’t have the opportunity to open up the house like you used to.”

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Air Filtration and Fresh Air Ventilation: The Benefits of Quality Indoor Air

Recently, Paul’s HVAC company found that, “throughout the pandemic, so many people were cooped up in their houses, especially during the early phases when there were lockdowns. The pandemic created these conversations and awareness of Indoor Air Quality, and we had a lot of customers—and even some of my family members—who had pets and allergies who were experiencing the effects of poor indoor air. But when we add in the ventilation and air filtration systems, the feedback we would get on that is ‘I don’t have to use my inhaler like I did’ and ‘I can tell the difference from when I go outside to when I come back in the house.’”

Luckily, several of his customers were able to enjoy quality indoor air, thanks to our Healthy Air solutions! “One of our customers that I worked closely with had a premature baby,” Paul tells us, “and she shared that they did not want to leave the house. When they did, her son’s breathing changed, and once they got back in the house, he was breathing much better.”

“That was a direct result of having the appropriate amount of ventilation and filtration in place. This was a real eye-opening case of the added benefits of these systems. Yes, you’re going to have a cleaner home, people can see that, but they don’t understand that what you’re breathing, and what your children are breathing, that’s the big difference between not having the systems in place versus having them in place.”

“As another example,” a more personal experience for Paul, he tells us, “my younger sister has really bad asthma and allergies. She has a dog and a cat, and she lives in an older home. She even noticed she wasn’t using her inhaler anymore when she was inside the house because of having that ventilation. By having that controlled ventilation, when coupled with the media air cleaner, it brought the health of the home to the point where she maybe uses her inhaler every now and then, as opposed to a couple of times a day.”

“Our team loves to see these real life and very close to home situations and the impact that our work can have,” Paul reflects. “How can you not want to talk about it when you know what type of impact that it can make?”

HVAC Company Advice for Quality Indoor Air

In conclusion, Paul shares this advice to anyone looking to do what it takes to enjoy quality indoor air: “I think that trying to research things online is such a slippery slope, and it’s hard to find really credible information that is unbiased. I think that when you talk to a NATE-certified service technician, they’re the ones who are in and out of homes more than anyone. You should find an HVAC company or contractor with that certification and that has an investment in Indoor Air Quality. They care for the customer and want to give them the most appropriate information versus the most convenient information. So, I think that it’s really important to get somebody certified and qualified to talk about all different homes and their equipment needs.”

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