Your home is a heating and cooling system, and there are many factors that contribute to or detract from its overall performance and comfort. While you may have the most efficient furnace, heat pump, or air conditioner, it won’t do its job well without proper insulation, air sealing, ductwork, and maintenance.
A healthy and comfortable home starts with insulation and air sealing.
Our trained, certified, and friendly technicians first audit the overall performance of your home to determine what will reap the highest benefits for you. From there, we determine which type of insulation you have, how well it’s working to seal your home, and then recommend the best solution for your comfort. We offer both spray foam and cellulose insulation to provide you with flexibility and comfort.
Save money on utility bills with air sealing
Air sealing is one of the most important – yet little known – building performance improvements around. Sealing hidden air leaks throughout your home improves comfort, lowers energy bills, and creates a more environmentally friendly home.
Air leaks occur when the air outside your home gets inside through cracks and other openings.
While a certain amount of airflow is necessary for health, too many air leaks in your home can be like leaving the window open all year round. With drafts, cold spots or leaks in the interior walls or duct system come wasted heat and air conditioning, discomfort, and increased utility bills.
Plus, your insulation won’t do its job as well as expected if there are air leaks.
As air sealing contractors at Minnick’s, we fix air leaks with a combination of caulk, foam, and other sealants, often with a primary focus on your home’s attic and basement – where air leaks occur most often.
We Are Your Local Maryland Insulation experts
Proper insulation plays an important role in both the summer and winter, helping to bring down your utility bills while increasing your comfort by keeping your home warmer in the winter and cooler in the summer. Insulation throughout your home from the roof to the foundation helps achieve maximum comfort.
Spray foam insulation by our spray foam insulation installers fills in all the gaps and spaces because it expands when sprayed. It doesn’t disintegrate like some cellulose insulation because it gets hard when sprayed. Plus, spray foam resists moisture more effectively.
Cellulose insulation is made of recycled newspaper. It’s commonly found in attics, new construction, walls, and retrofit situations.
Insulation plays an important role in making sure your whole home is as energy efficient as possible.
Energy audit spots air leaks
A Home Energy Audit provides you with a comprehensive view of how your home functions to achieve comfort and efficiency, identifying problem spots and recommendations on how to address them to achieve your home comfort goals.
The audit looks at every room and identifies areas of energy loss. Minnick’s pays special attention to the basement, crawlspace, attic, and combustion appliances.
Using a blower door to test for leaks, Minnick’s certified energy auditors test your home for air leaks and cracks. We also conduct a visual inspection of ductwork, and a load calculation of whether or not your equipment is delivering enough or too much air to the rooms in your home.
While insulation and air sealing solve some of the problems we find in energy audits, Minnick’s also make suggestions for other ways you can achieve greater comfort and efficiency in your home.
Schedule an insulation or air sealing appointment today!
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Do you have a question we can answer? Call us at 301-953-2820, we’re happy to help!
Not usually – most insulation is applied to help maintain a consistent temperature, not reduce noise.
Most parts of a home’s exterior should be insulated, including the following:
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- Attic
- Crawl space
- Exterior walls
- Any area that doesn’t have heating & cooling
It is based on R-values. The higher the R-value, the better the insulation value. No matter what you are working with, it is critical to follow the R-value specifications.
Most AHJ’s (Authority Having Jurisdiction) require insulation for new home construction. On existing homes, insulation is extremely helpful in regulating consistent temperatures and helping a home’s overall energy efficiency.
The main benefit is helping to retain heat/cooling depending on the season. This helps your home and family enjoy more consistent temperatures, and it also helps reduce heating/cooling bills.
- Sometimes you can see if insulation is missing or needs to be replaced, especially in attics and crawl spaces.
- If you have access to a thermal gun or infrared thermometer, this can help you see where you have insulation issues.
- You can also ask a heating/cooling professional, such as our team at Minnick’s, to come to inspect your home and perform an energy audit.
It can be, depending on the insulation and application. Please refer to the insulation specs or talk with our team at Minnicks about what we would recommend for your home.
We recommend using spray foam because it insulates and does better at sealing air cracks. Fiberglass insulation, on the other hand, only insulates – it doesn’t seal the air.
Insulation almost always needs to be replaced when wet.
It depends on the type of insulation. Standard fiberglass insulation is mostly non-combustible, but the paper or foil surrounding the insulation is usually more flammable.
View all the HVAC services we provide in Central MD to keep your home comfortable and efficient year-round!
Heating
Expert repairs, maintenance, or installation services for your furnace, heat pump, or boiler.
Insulation & Air Sealing
Is your new HVAC equipment, not heating and cooling your home well? Without proper insulation, air sealing, and ductwork, even the most efficient equipment can perform poorly.
Cooling
Is your home not keeping you cool as it should? We can diagnose, tune-up, and repair your air conditioning system.
Home Energy Efficiency
Did you know residential homes waste between 10%-50% of the energy they create? If you’re ready to lower your monthly utility bills and increase your home comfort, we offer Home Performance Energy Audits.
Plumbing
Dealing with a leaky pipe or clogged drain? We offer full-service plumbing repairs, installations, and preventative inspections.
Indoor Air Quality
Did you know your home’s IAQ can be up to 4x-5x more polluted than the air outside? We offer whole-home air purification systems to create a healthy indoor environment for you and your family.
YOUR LOCAL INSULATION CONTRACTOR IN CENTRAL MD
You’ve done everything you can think of to make your home more energy efficient.
You’ve replaced old windows, installed new appliances, turned down the thermostat, and shortened your shower time – yet your utility bill is still way higher than it should be.
What is going on? There’s a good chance your culprit is poor insulation and inadequate air sealing.
In fact, you can lose 25% percent of your home’s heat through the attic if it isn’t insulated properly.
Thankfully, the insulation experts at Minnicks can cut your utility bills and keep you comfortable with your choice of spray foam insulation, cellulose insulation, and air sealing services.
You’ll be settling down for a cozy evening home without needing to double check the thermostat in no time at all!
Having a home that is properly insulated is a huge plus. Good insulation in a home cuts energy costs, controls condensation, and even acts as a fire barrier.
Beyond that, you’ll get a quick return on investment with insulation. In fact, the return on investment or payback for an investment in insulation is quick – usually anywhere from 6 months to 2 years.
On the other hand, the results of poor insulation are disastrous:
- High monthly utility bills
- HVAC equipment wearing out sooner than expected
- Condensation. Damp. and mold growth may develop
- Housing components (like shingles) have a shortened lifespan
- Your health can suffer from a cold or damp home
Let’s just say it’s 100% your time and money to get your home well insulated!
But we know how much work it can be to complete a task – even if that task should be completed. After all, we know we should exercise and eat well, but that proves to be a fairly difficult goal!
That’s why the team at Minnick’s is completely committed to helping you make good insulation decisions – and then assisting to make each step of the job as easy as possible.
And we guarantee that we keep everything from simple and straightforward from start to finish. Here’s what you can expect from us:
A trained, certified, and friendly technician will audit the overall performance of your home to determine what will reap the highest benefits for you.
We’ll determine how well your current insulation is working, and make a recommendation for the best solution to your problem.
We’ll use spray foam or cellulose to insulate your home while you watch in comfort!
If you want to experience this same kind of hassle-free experience with other services, don’t hesitate to get in touch with us!
- Ashton
- Beltsville
- Bethesda
- Brinklow
- Burtonsville
- Clarksville
- Columbia, MD
- Ellicott City
- Fulton
- Highland
- Howard County
- Hyattsville
- Laurel
- Montgomery County
- Sandy Spring
- Silver Spring
- Spencerville
- And more!
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