Even with the financial fallout from the pandemic and the inflation that has been raging ever since, we’re doing alright. It wasn’t always the case though as we were worried that we might have to sell our house. The fact is that when we bought this place, it was at the very outer edge of our budget for paying a mortgage. And then, we replaced the residential HVAC, added a deck and replaced the carpet with faux wood floors. So it’s not like we had a bunch of savings left after forking over the downpayment and doing all the renovations. When my wife and I were sent home from our offices to work from home in our own air conditioning, we had to take huge pay cuts. So we were in a jam right away. The first thing we did was to cut our spending dramatically. The Summer of 2020 was one of the hottest I’ve had to work through in my life. We cranked the thermostat way up in order to save as much as possible on air conditioning costs. And we saved almost 30 percent over the previous Summer which is quite remarkable. But that along with our other cost savings strategies just wasn’t enough. And that’s when it dawned on us to create a nice, one bedroom apartment in the basement. There was already a bathroom and shower. Plus, the basement had it’s own entrance. We took care of everything but the heating and cooling. For that, we had the HVAC professionals come out and install a ductless heat pump. It’s been awesome and our renter loves it. For sure, we love having that extra revenue stream and the mortgage is always covered now.
Commercial air conditioning system