What a Replacement Quote Should Contain, and Why Three Bids Differ

Usually not the box. The gap between bids is nearly always the work around it, and three line items account for most of it: what happens to your chimney once the old furnace stops venting into it, whether anybody calculated the size, and whether a permit is being pulled. Ask each bidder to price those three separately and the quotes become comparable in an afternoon.

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Line item one: the chimney your old furnace was keeping warm

This is the single item most likely to explain a difference of thousands, and it is invisible until somebody names it. Oak Ridge National Laboratory describes the sequence exactly. Where a noncondensing furnace and an atmospheric water heater are common-vented through a masonry or metal chimney, the furnace is removed, the flue inlet it used is sealed and the new condensing furnace is vented through a side wall, the water heater is, in the laboratory's word, orphaned on the original vent. The reason that matters is arithmetic rather than opinion: the chimney's cross-sectional area was sized to vent two appliances and now serves one, so Oak Ridge records that there could be insufficient draft to properly exhaust the flue gases from the water heater under some ambient temperature and wind conditions. It names two practical remedies, a Type B chimney liner properly sized for just the water heater, or a powered draft inducer with backflow preventer, and states plainly that both result in extra costs. In a city where 69.3 percent of occupied homes are heated with utility gas, this is not an edge case.

Why the new furnace cannot simply use the flue that is already there

Homeowners reasonably assume the chimney is the chimney. The equipment categories say otherwise. Oak Ridge National Laboratory states that in every upgrade of this kind the existing noncondensing furnace is served by a negative static pressure vent, a clay tile lined masonry chimney or a Type B double-wall metal chimney terminating above the roof, and that this existing vent cannot be used by the new condensing furnace directly. It describes three options: reuse the existing vertical vent as a chase for the new venting system, install a new horizontal side-wall vent system where physical constraints and codes allow, or run a new vertical vent through the building, which the laboratory calls difficult and costly. And it says the part that explains your spread of quotes: in all of these cases there are added costs compared with a like-for-like noncondensing furnace replacement. So when one bid is for a high efficiency furnace and another is for a noncondensing unit, you are not comparing two prices for the same job. You are comparing two different jobs.

The duty the code attaches the moment an appliance leaves a chimney

New York's residential code speaks to this directly, and the trigger is the event rather than the calendar. Section M1801.3 applies where an appliance is permanently disconnected from an existing chimney or vent, or connected to an existing chimney or vent during a new installation, which is precisely what a furnace replacement does. Section M1801.3.1 then requires the chimney or vent to be resized as necessary to control flue gas condensation in its interior and to provide the appliance or appliances served with the required draft. Sections M1801.3.2 through M1801.3.4 require the flue gas passageway to be free of obstructions and combustible deposits, require cleaning where the flue previously served a solid or liquid fuel appliance, require a cleanout opening in masonry chimneys and set clearance to combustibles. One thing we will not tell you is that a particular level of chimney inspection is triggered, because the standard people cite for that is not published at any public address we can quote from, and every description of it we found traced to a chimney company rather than to a standards body.

Your contractor is supposed to raise the water heater without being asked

There is a published expectation on this, and it is useful to be able to point at it. The Department of Energy's Building America Solution Center gas furnace replacement checklist states that if installing a direct-vent gas furnace results in an orphaned gas water heater still connected to an existing chimney that may now have inadequate draft to remove the water heater's combustion emissions, the contractor shall inform the homeowner of necessary remediation steps, giving a chimney liner as its example. That is the disclosure, and it belongs in the conversation before you sign rather than in a phone call from the basement on install day. If a bid does not mention the water heater at all, that is not proof of anything. It is a question. Ask what happens to the water heater venting when the furnace comes out, and ask for the answer in writing, because the difference between a bid that carries this item and one that does not is the difference you are trying to explain.

Where the new vent may come out of a wall, in a city that gets 123.8 inches of snow

Side-wall venting has geometry rules, and in Syracuse one of them is not academic. Oak Ridge National Laboratory records the constraints that restrict side-wall vents: the exhaust pipe must be a minimum of two feet from a window, door or decking, exhaust and intake pipes must be above the highest anticipated snow level including possible drifting snow, intake pipes must be at least two feet from dryer or power-vented water heater exhaust, exhaust cannot be pointed into prevailing winds or at a neighboring house, and exhaust and intake must be on the same wall so they see the same wind pressures. New York's own code adds the floor: section G2427.8 requires the bottom of a vent terminal to be located not less than 12 inches above finished ground level, with further clearances from doors, operable windows and air inlets. The annual snowfall normal at Syracuse Hancock International Airport is 123.8 inches, with 92 inches of that falling in December, January and February. Where a termination sits on the wall is worth asking about, and worth looking at after the first real storm.

Line item two: the load calculation, priced or absent

Section M1401.3 of the Residential Code of New York State says heating and cooling equipment shall be sized in accordance with ACCA Manual S based on building loads calculated in accordance with ACCA Manual J, or other approved methodologies. That is a piece of work somebody either did or did not do, and it is the main reason two bidders can propose different capacities for the same house and both sound confident. On a quote it can appear as a line, or as a sentence in the scope, or not at all. Ask each bidder for the worksheet. It is the cheapest comparison tool you have, because once you are holding three of them the argument stops being about brands and starts being about one number that describes your house. Our separate guide on sizing goes through what the worksheet contains and what the inputs mean.

Line item three: the permit, and what it is actually buying you

A permit does two things for a homeowner. It brings an inspection, which is the only independent look anybody takes at work that will be hidden behind a furnace cabinet for twenty years, and it requires the contractor to hold whatever credentials the municipality asks for, which the cheapest bidder may not have. In the City of Syracuse, the Central Permit Office lists its residential construction permit categories and then states that all trade and fire prevention permits, giving HVAC, electrical, fire alarm and sprinkler as its examples, must be obtained separately. Whether a permit is required for your address is decided by your own city, town or village rather than by the state or the county, and the answer genuinely differs across this metro. Our permits guide sets out what each municipality publishes and which office to call. What matters on a quote is simple: is the permit included, who is pulling it, and is the fee in the number you are looking at.

The alarm rule you already live under, and why it exists

Since 2010 New York has required carbon monoxide alarms in homes regardless of when they were built. The rule implementing Amanda's Law amended the Residential Code and the Fire Code of New York State to require carbon monoxide alarms in all one and two family dwellings, townhouses, condominium and cooperative dwelling accommodations and multiple dwellings, without regard to the date of construction or sale, replacing an earlier rule that reached only homes built or offered for sale after 2002. The state's code agencies restate it for existing property: section 705 of the Property Maintenance Code requires carbon monoxide alarms in accordance with the Fire Code, whose section 915.1 covers new and existing residential buildings. We raise it here for one reason, which is that combustion venting work is the moment to confirm your alarms are in place and working, and that is a conversation to have with whoever does the installation.

How to make three bids genuinely comparable, in one email

Send all three bidders the same four questions and read the replies next to each other. One, what design temperature and what calculated load did you size this from, and may I have the worksheet. Two, what happens to the water heater venting when the old furnace comes out, and what does that work cost as its own line. Three, is a permit included, who pulls it and with which office. Four, what are the model numbers, and is the equipment current production. A bid that omits the venting work is not cheaper than one that includes it, it is smaller, and the difference will arrive later either as a change order or as work nobody did. One more item worth asking about while somebody is standing in the basement: section 27-54(h) of the City of Syracuse Property Conservation Code requires direct-fired heat producing equipment and its enclosure to have a supply of air adequate to replenish that consumed by complete combustion, which is a question about the room as much as about the appliance. When you have the answers, send them to us with your address and we will connect you with licensed, insured contractors who will price the whole job rather than part of it.