Scott Brechbill says when the heat went out at his Stuart home Wednesday, the timing Wednesday couldn't have been worse.
“With how cold it was with the kids, especially the baby, there’s no way to keep her warm,” he says.
Stories like that have kept repair crews across the Treasure Coast busy.
“I know all of the companies are running crazy right now,” says Donald Myers, a contractor for AC Care Heat and Repair.
We followed AC Care around Thursday.
One of the biggest problems, they say, is we don’t use our heat very often.
“You go to call for the heat and the switch is just stuck because it hasn’t moved in 6 years,” he says.
Issues like that often call for professional maintenance.
In other cases, your lack of heat could be because of dead batteries in your thermostat or even dirty air filers.
“This hot freon is being pushed to the indoor coil...you don’t want starve it with air, you need a nice clean filter in there,” Brechbill says.
The important lessons to learn from this cold snap - don’t forget yearly maintenance, and don’t wait until its cold to test your heat.
“Kick it on, let it run, 5 or 10 minutes, feel the heat coming out of the vents and shut it off.”
With temps hovering at or below freezing Thursday, Brechbill is happy the heat is back on.
“We made it through last night all sharing one room, so to have the whole house be warm tonight I think will be ready for it.”
