What's your weather?

[fast_and_bulbous]

No forced air unfortunately-- boiler with radiators (which is the norm around here), so putting in central AC is non-trivial.

There are a ton of windows for better and worse (house was built in 1890 pre electricity)-- I love the amount of light, and as you say it will help with cross breezes, but they will need insulating blinds. The bedrooms also have ceiling fans which will help.

I'm really pretty happy at about 78-80 degrees so don't need a ton of cooling, just enough for the hottest days and cooling down the upstairs a bit at night. I looked at portable (vent with a hose out the window instead of sitting in the window themselves) units online today, and they are pretty reasonable and double as dehumidifiers, so I'll probably get a couple of those. I don't relish trying to install and remove window units every year, or blocking my nice windows, so those seem preferable.   

Our last house was built in the 90s and had hot water heat, 2 levels... which was friggin' fantastic. But, no AC, which was not. We tried wall units, followed by one of those hose jobs you mention and returned it the next day it was so ineffective. So finally we relented and had central AC installed with ducts installed for the upstairs bedrooms and the kitchen area (it had an open plan upstairs) and that kept most of the house cool at least. There were places where the AC didn't reach w/out fans, but that was expected. You may be able to do something like that if you are ambitious.

[polly_mer]

No forced air unfortunately-- boiler with radiators (which is the norm around here), so putting in central AC is non-trivial.

There are a ton of windows for better and worse (house was built in 1890 pre electricity)-- I love the amount of light, and as you say it will help with cross breezes, but they will need insulating blinds. The bedrooms also have ceiling fans which will help.

I'm really pretty happy at about 78-80 degrees so don't need a ton of cooling, just enough for the hottest days and cooling down the upstairs a bit at night. I looked at portable (vent with a hose out the window instead of sitting in the window themselves) units online today, and they are pretty reasonable and double as dehumidifiers, so I'll probably get a couple of those. I don't relish trying to install and remove window units every year, or blocking my nice windows, so those seem preferable.   

Our last house was built in the 90s and had hot water heat, 2 levels... which was friggin' fantastic. But, no AC, which was not. We tried wall units, followed by one of those hose jobs you mention and returned it the next day it was so ineffective. So finally we relented and had central AC installed with ducts installed for the upstairs bedrooms and the kitchen area (it had an open plan upstairs) and that kept most of the house cool at least. There were places where the AC didn't reach w/out fans, but that was expected. You may be able to do something like that if you are ambitious.

When we priced central AC for the current house with hot water heat and 2 levels, it came to $25k.  Right now, we're making do with a couple portable hose jobbies and continuing to curse the previous owners who took out the ceiling fans (switches exist, patches on the ceilings exist, no overhead lighting or fans).

We've been here almost 3 years and continue to laugh bitterly every time a local states something like "you don't need AC; just plan to take vacation for the one week a year that we get above 90 deg. F".  Yep, it's a dry heat.  Yep, a dry heat can go much hotter than a wet heat before we're uncomfortable.  Yet, we spend several weeks every year at the "damn, it needs to be cooler than this at night for us to sleep and we can't do anything during the day other than sit on the couch and whine" condition without the portable hose jobbies.

[fleabite]

9:00 AM here, 88° outside, 91° in my apartment, and humid as heck. In an hour or two I will close the windows as the temperature differential disappears, to keep the "cool" air inside for the rest of the day.

[fast_and_bulbous]

No forced air unfortunately-- boiler with radiators (which is the norm around here), so putting in central AC is non-trivial.

There are a ton of windows for better and worse (house was built in 1890 pre electricity)-- I love the amount of light, and as you say it will help with cross breezes, but they will need insulating blinds. The bedrooms also have ceiling fans which will help.

I'm really pretty happy at about 78-80 degrees so don't need a ton of cooling, just enough for the hottest days and cooling down the upstairs a bit at night. I looked at portable (vent with a hose out the window instead of sitting in the window themselves) units online today, and they are pretty reasonable and double as dehumidifiers, so I'll probably get a couple of those. I don't relish trying to install and remove window units every year, or blocking my nice windows, so those seem preferable.   

Our last house was built in the 90s and had hot water heat, 2 levels... which was friggin' fantastic. But, no AC, which was not. We tried wall units, followed by one of those hose jobs you mention and returned it the next day it was so ineffective. So finally we relented and had central AC installed with ducts installed for the upstairs bedrooms and the kitchen area (it had an open plan upstairs) and that kept most of the house cool at least. There were places where the AC didn't reach w/out fans, but that was expected. You may be able to do something like that if you are ambitious.

When we priced central AC for the current house with hot water heat and 2 levels, it came to $25k.  Right now, we're making do with a couple portable hose jobbies and continuing to curse the previous owners who took out the ceiling fans (switches exist, patches on the ceilings exist, no overhead lighting or fans).

We've been here almost 3 years and continue to laugh bitterly every time a local states something like "you don't need AC; just plan to take vacation for the one week a year that we get above 90 deg. F".  Yep, it's a dry heat.  Yep, a dry heat can go much hotter than a wet heat before we're uncomfortable.  Yet, we spend several weeks every year at the "damn, it needs to be cooler than this at night for us to sleep and we can't do anything during the day other than sit on the couch and whine" condition without the portable hose jobbies.

Ugh, you have my sympathies. I can't recall how much we paid but it wasn't cheap, but it was less than your quote, probalby because we only did it for part of the house.  Despite the cost both of us had no regrets afterwards, and this was in the upper midwest where you only really "needed it" a few weeks out of the year (getting longer with time of course).

I may have gotten a bad "hose jobbie" - my old trusty wall unit that I got in grad school lasted like 25 years and worked quite nicely. It didn't work well with the windows we had in the last place, however. I ended up using cardboard in the window to get things to "work". Bleah, I don't miss that. New house has forced air which we both kind of grumbled about (we both looove hot water heat) but we got over it pretty fast with the convenience of one set of ducts for both heat and cold.

[polly_mer]

I may have gotten a bad "hose jobbie" - my old trusty wall unit that I got in grad school lasted like 25 years and worked quite nicely. It didn't work well with the windows we had in the last place, however. I ended up using cardboard in the window to get things to "work".

We spent about $15k for new windows for half the house (we opened them once when we moved in and then they wouldn't shut) and another $10k for insulation for that same half the house.  That half the house tends to be pretty good at maintaining temperature as long as we're on top of opening/closing windows so we don't use the hose jobbies there.  We did jury-rig up window and door blockers for the hose jobbies to get them to work; the really unfortunate thing is the windows in that part of the house either don't open or open wrong to put window units.  We have three outside doors and we can only use one during the summer to avoid messing up the hose jobbie setups.

The sad part is we discovered on the day the insulation guys came that our estimate was for only half the house because there's no way to access the crawl space in the other half the house.  Thus, that's another several thousand dollars on the list to have someone come to cut and install a door and then do the insulation.  There's sometimes a 15 F degree temperature gradient from the kitchen to the master bedroom.

[ab_grp]

We're supposed to be in the hundreds again (105).  No humidity, though. 

I've been reading the posts here about AC for older homes without forced air heat.  My mother's house was built in the 1960s (I think) and is just sweltering upstairs in the summer.  I grew up in the home, and we had a few window fans that did not do much.  She has a fan in the entry way and an attic fan that helps a bit to keep the heat from accumulating up there.  It's a bi-level, so the downstairs can be fairly cool and a good place to be in the summer.  There are AC units in the dining room upstairs and family room below it, but she/we have never used them for whatever reason.  Unfortunately, bedrooms are upstairs.  The house my ex and I bought was almost a twin of my mom's, but the previous owners had installed forced air heat and central AC, which was wonderful but inefficient and sometimes expensive because it's tough to keep a house like that evenly temperatured.  In any case, my mom is considering some AC option again (she has owned the house for 40 years, and this comes up now and again) both for her comfort and for eventual resale value.

[mamselle]

An 18th c. dress is very cool if the panniers are wide enough.

M.

[Juvenal]

An 18th c. dress is very cool if the panniers are wide enough.

M.

I suppose a deep décolletage might assist as well.

[mamselle]

An 18th c. dress is very cool if the panniers are wide enough.

M.

I suppose a deep décolletage might assist as well.

Yes, although this is a day dress, so not very off-the-shoulder, more a squared neckline with a chemise showing under.

But they're all all-cotton, so very comfortable, in fact.

M.

[polly_mer]

We have noticeable relative humidity (i.e., more than 10%), so it's sticky and hot with clouds.

I am not heartened by the weather forecast of "Overcast. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible", which usually means one gets drenched by being outside for the wrong 10 minutes, but nothing cools off and one stays in wet clothes until one changes, just as though we were in the Midwest instead of a desert with 300 days of sun per year.

[mamselle]

Yesterday was cool enough, breezy, cloudy enough, and comfortable enough that the two minutes of evaporating rain (fulfilling the 20% chance of rain spread out over the 6 afternoon hours of the forecast, I suppose) was as nothing.

Today, similarly, is slightly warm, but comfortable.

M.

[KevinMcCabe]

23 degrees today. Mostly cloudy. Okay for August

[Juvenal]

23 degrees today. Mostly cloudy. Okay for August

One hopes that's Celsius and Northern Hemisphere.  The bulk of Fora members are likely Fahrenhotties.

[polly_mer]

We're finally down to nice fall weather with mid-70 degrees F during the day and mid-50 degrees F at night.

[saffie]

There's a lovely cool breeze today that is refreshing after melting from the heat and humidity all summer. I think we still have a few 80+ days in store, but fall is definitely on the way.