Your furnace is most likely one of your home’s most expensive appliances. Due to the high cost of repairing or replacing a furnace when there is a problem, individuals analyze goodman furnaces closely when acquiring a home or having a new system installed.

How long does a furnace last? This is one of the most often asked questions I get. In this article, I’ll look into those topics and offer some suggestions for extending the life of your HVAC system.

What Is the Average Life Expectancy of a Furnace?

When answering this issue, my favorite comparison is to compare your furnace to a classic car.

The short answer to the question of how long a furnace will endure is that it will last as long as you want it to. That is to say, there is no set date when a furnace must be completely replaced.

Take classic cars for example we still see cars on the road that were built 40, 50, 60, and even 90 years ago, right? Those autos required maintenance along the road because no vehicle is built to last indefinitely.

To keep those cars on the road, people just corrected whatever was wrong with them. Some of them were probably in much worse shape than others, but the point is that someone wanted to keep the car running, so they did.

The same can be said of a furnace. It can last as long as you want to keep fixing it, and there aren’t many situations where you’ll have to replace the complete system (apart from a catastrophic disaster). When a furnace has a problem, it usually means that one part of an assembly of parts has failed and needs to be replaced.

When is it time to replace your furnace?

There are two main reasons why people decide to replace their furnaces.

1. It is dangerous to use.

2. Repairing your furnace is impractical (it’s no longer reliable, it’s too expensive, etc.).

Although you can legally retain a furnace for as long as you wish, there are some situations where repair is not feasible. A damaged heat exchanger, for example, is a major problem because it allows carbon monoxide to flow into your home. The furnace will continue to operate normally, but lethal gas will be pouring out.

In that instance, it’s more cost-effective to replace the unit rather than rebuild the heat exchanger. New heat exchangers may not be available if the equipment is older.

Any time there is a safety hazard or the furnace simply cannot be repaired, it is a good idea to replace the entire unit.

A fire in the residence that has severely damaged the unit, a storm or other act of nature that has severely damaged the unit, or an earthquake are all examples of this. Anything that has caused so much harm to the equipment that it is no longer repairable.

It’s also possible that your furnace has reached the point where parts are constantly breaking down, rendering it unreliable. The replacement may be a wise idea if you live in a region where your furnace is critical and frequent service outages are dangerous.

What are the advantages of having my furnace replaced?

Returning to our car analogy, there are several advantages to purchasing a new vehicle, including technological developments.

Older vehicles were built at a time when we didn’t know as much about the air/fuel combination in the engine, aerodynamic design, and other fuel-saving techniques.

The same can be said of furnaces. A furnace that is more than ten years old may not burn natural gas as efficiently as a younger unit. Aside from any safety concerns, if you have an older furnace that requires frequent repairs, a newer type may offer the extra benefit of decreased operating costs.

You may also be able to benefit from more current management features such as programmable or internet-connected thermostats, more robust climate control settings, and quieter operation.

Final Thoughts

So there you have it: the real answer to how long a top hvac brands furnace lasts. You can theoretically make a furnace last a lifetime if you take care of it, perform routine maintenance, and continue to repair it.

However, this isn’t always the case, and changing your furnace comes with a slew of advantages. The best course of action is to make your heating system’s safety a top concern before making financial considerations.