Insulation contractors are experts when it comes to installing proper home insulation. Home insulation is crucial when you’re considering an investment in heating, ventilation, air conditioning (HVAC), and green energy sources for your home. It’ll help save energy by keeping the air inside and avoid outside air from entering the home. A home that’s properly insulated is more comfortable, quiet, and energy efficient. Keep the inside of your home a better place to live in by hiring a trusted, experienced, and reliable insulation contractor.
Here are some important benefits of having properly installed home insulation.
Insulation Contractors Can Help You Choose the Best Insulation Type
Insulation contractors are experts in determining the best insulation type for every home, whether you have an older or modern home. The type of insulation you’ll need depends on the location, or part of the house you want to insulate, and the purpose, such as heat protection or soundproofing.
The most common materials for home insulation include foam, cellulose, and fiberglass. On the other hand, the different types of insulation include loose-fill, rolls, batts, spray board, vapor barriers, and foam board.
Here are the different types of insulation, applications, and installation methods:
- Blanket Type (Rolls and Batts): It’s made of fiberglass, natural fibers, or plastic fibers. This type of insulation is relatively inexpensive and applicable for ceilings and walls (foundation and unfinished walls) that can be fitted between joists, beams, and studs.
- Concrete Block Insulation: It’s made of foam board that can be placed inside the walls (existing homes) or outside the walls (new homes). The installation of concrete block insulation requires specialized skills, such as one from Insulation Contractors.
- Rigid Foam or Foam Board: This insulation type is made of polyisocyanurate, polyurethane, or polystyrene. It’s applicable for unvented low-slope roofs, ceilings, and floors, as well as foundation and unfinished walls. Foam boards have a high insulating value. When installed properly over joists or frames, rigid foam can effectively block short circuits.
- Insulating concrete forms (ICFs): This type of insulation is made of either foam blocks or foam boards, which is applicable for unfinished walls and foundation walls. Because the insulation is built into the walls of a house, it creates a high thermal resistance.
- Loose-fill Blown-in Insulation: It’s made of either fiberglass, cellulose, or mineral wool that can be installed to open wall cavities, unfinished attic floors, enclosed existing walls, and other hard-to-reach places. Because of its bubble-form, it’s suitable for irregular framing or any obstructions present.
- Reflective System: This insulation type is suitable for framing, which is either made of foil-faced kraft paper, polyethylene bubbles, cardboard, or plastic film. It can be installed on unfinished walls, floors, and ceilings, and effectively prevents downward heat flow.
- Foamed-in-place or Sprayed Foam: It’s made of either phenolic, cementitious, polyurethane, or polyisocyanurate, which is installed in open wall cavities and enclosed existing walls. This insulation is applied using a pressure spray container, which is used to add insulation to irregularly shaped areas, around obstructions, and existing finished areas.
Proper Home Insulation to Maintain a Comfortable Indoor Temperature
Having proper home insulation will ensure that you keep your desired temperature inside the home to keep you and your family comfortable at all times. Sealing all possible air leaks will ensure that the air inside the home won’t escape. In that way, your heating and cooling appliances won’t need to exert extra effort to keep you comfortable warm or cold.
Insulation Reduces Noise Pollution
Another important benefit of proper home insulation is soundproofing. If you’re living in high-traffic areas or cities, noises tend to be louder, even until midnight. Sleep and rest are compromised if the outside environment is too noisy.
Outside noises can be extremely disturbing to family members, most especially if your bedroom is near the street. Children who are busy studying their lessons or doing their homework can easily get distracted.
Because of the insulation materials that enclose the primary source of the noise, which forms a barrier to absorb vibrations, insulation can limit the sound transmission.
Here are good-to-know facts about soundproofing using insulation:
- Not all types of insulation can reduce noise – reflective insulation. Reflective insulation is not an effective sound barrier. This type of insulation only provides solar heat protection, keeping inside the home more comfortable.
- The best choices for soundproofing insulation that reduces outside noises and room noises between different home levels are foam, cellulose, and fiberglass insulation.
The different sound types are impact and airborne noises. Airborne noises usually come from the external or outside environment, such as loud voices or shouting, loud music, TV, and traffic. On the other hand, impact noises are vibrations from appliances and footsteps. Insulation reduces both sources of noise.
Here are the benefits of having a soundproofed home:
- Keep family discussions within the home.
- Home insulation avoids your neighbors from hearing your family stories and next vacation plans.
- Rest and sleep in a serene home.
- Enjoy watching the news or a movie without hearing outside noises. It means that pure entertainment is achieved.
- Keep your children happy because they’re always sleeping on time and can study at home without distraction from neighbors or the environment outside.
Insulation Saves You More Money
Remember that a well-insulated home is energy efficient because of minimum heating and cooling is required. It means that your HVAC system won’t use much energy to provide the right temperature you need to be comfortable.
The size of your house and the insulation type will determine how much money you’ll save. Old houses need a lot of rework, while modern houses were usually built with great insulation standards, so minimal insulation work is involved.
Here are the good-to-know facts about insulation and energy-saving:
- For best results, you can insulate your floors, walls, doors, and roof.
- When it comes to maximum energy-saving, wall insulation will save you more money because about 30 to 40 percent of the heat is lost through the walls.
- Insulating your roof will avoid 25 percent heat loss, whereas insulating your doors and windows will prevent 20 percent of heat loss.
Insulation Increases Home Value
Homebuyers prefer energy-efficient homes because it can help them save from electricity or utility bills. With insulation added to a home, it’s an excellent way to keep the indoor temperature at a comfortable level.
Home inspectors tend to include a lack of basic insulation in their report. For instance, old doors let in hot and cold air, thus increasing your energy expenditure. It means that your HVAC appliances will double or triple their efforts to make you comfortable. That’s why if you want to make your home profitable in the long run, invest in energy-efficient measures, like installing proper insulation.
Here are the details of the article recently published by Money Crashers about improving home insulation and increase property value:
- Make your home even more appealing to potential buyers by updating your home.
- You can save around $2,500, or even more, every year by properly insulating your home. A minor change can do a lot. For instance, adding attic insulation can save you hundreds of dollars on your electricity bill.
- By sealing cracks, you can save energy costs. A handheld device or thermal leak detector can be used to check leaks. It alerts when the temperature changes around the house.
- More insulation is required around windows and doors, light switches, electrical sockets, in the basement, attic hatch, in recessed lighting, and anywhere wires or ducts run outside the home.
Make Your Home Safer with Home Insulation
A home that’s properly insulated is a safer home. It protects your home because insulation prevents accidental burns and lower hot surface temperatures. Also, when combined with other materials, it’s a great fire protector.
Insulation protects your home from grease and air ducts, firestop systems, and problems caused by communications and electrical cables and outlets. Also, many types of home insulation are impermeable to nuisance pests.
Proper Home Insulation to Conserve Energy
The energy-conservation of any type of insulation is determined by the R-value. When it comes to home insulation, the R-value refers to the thermal resistance and reduced heat flow of insulation material. Thicker insulation means higher R-value with more insulating capacity. Talk to your builder about the R-value of your home.
Here are the different areas you may consider adding insulation to help conserve energy:
- Attic: It’s a great part of the house to start installing your insulation. It’s easy, quick, and cost-effective by sealing air leaks. For finishing the attic, install insulation against the roof. Doing so will reduce musty smells if you reside in a humid climate and conserve so much energy, most especially if the ducts of your heating and cooling system passes through a space. As mentioned, one type of roof insulation is sprayed foam polyurethane. Because it blocks water vapor, molds to rafters, and has a higher R-rating per inch than other insulation types, it’s best for attic insulation.
- Main Floor Walls: It’s easy to add wall insulation in the main floors ins stud bays. A contractor will simply drill small holes in the wall then blow the insulating material. If the walls have existing insulation, you cannot add more insulating material without tearing into the plaster or drywall. After this, you can add insulating material underneath.
- Crawl Spaces and Basements: Heat is lost in various directions. Aside from insulating your roof and walls, it’s also equally important to insulate the bottom. Did you know that energy loss in crawl spaces and basements is as much as 30 percent? For finishing the basement, cover the foam using a stud wall and fill with fiberglass insulation. Lastly, cover it with drywall.
Improve Health Through Proper Home Insulation
A poorly ventilated home will put a family at risk for different medical problems, most especially respiratory health conditions, such as flu, colds, pneumonia, and asthma.
Cold easily enters a house without insulation or poor insulation. That’s why you should consider installing one or upgrade your existing home insulation.
Here are some effective ways to insulate your home to avoid health problems:
- Weatherstripping: Prevent drafts by putting weatherstripping around windows and doors. It blocks air from entering through the seams. Use weatherstripping that comes with adhesive backing. Cut it according to the height enough for the window or door seam. Remove the weatherstripping’s back and secure it by pressing it into place.
- Sealing Gaps: Adding sealant around the wall and floor cracks and gaps will prevent heat loss. Applying a silicone sealant will fill the cracks and gaps. Also, you can use caulk to seal the gaps.
- Door Sweeps: To prevent air from entering your home, you can place door sweeps to cover the space between the bottom of the door and the floor. It’ll prevent drafts or air from blowing under. A door sweep can be cut to the width of the door, peeling off the backing of the adhesive, and attaching it to the bottom. If the door sweep is not adhesive, you can nail it into the door using the provided hardware.
- Thick Curtains: Prevent heat loss by installing thick curtains in front of windows because whenever you leave windows uncovered, cold air will transfer inside your home. Hanging thick and dark curtains will keep them closed, thus keeping your house warm.
- Use Carpets or Rugs: Carpeting and rugs help your room stay warm. Aside from floor insulation, you can lay out carpets, rugs, or blankets to your floor and keep the heat inside the home.
- Double-pane windows: Installing double-pane windows can prevent air leaks. You may contact a window specialist if you don’t have a double-pane window for replacement.
Convenience, Comfort, and Peace of Mind
For your utmost comfort, convenience, and peace of mind, it’s important to have a well-insulated home. For one, you can safeguard your health and safety, avoiding the frequency of respiratory problems in the family. It reduces hospitalization and medication, which can be costly for a large family. If you want a comfortable place to live, make sure that your home is well-insulated. Children and seniors are vulnerable to temperature changes, and they’re the ones who are usually affected by extreme weather changes. Keep your family healthy and safe by upgrading your home insulation. Save yourself from the inconvenience of seeking medical help, paying high electricity bills, and discomfort caused by a home with irregular temperature.
