The $5,000 rule, remaining life, and refrigerant availability — a straightforward framework for the decision nobody wants to make in January.
Multiply the age of the equipment by the cost of the repair. If the result is over $5,000, replacement is usually the better financial move. It's crude, but it reflects how repair frequency accelerates in the last quarter of a system's life.
Two things override the math. A cracked heat exchanger is a safety condition, not a repair decision. And a system still on R-22 gets expensive to keep charged, because the refrigerant is no longer produced.
The other half of the decision is what a replacement gets you beyond heat: two-stage or modulating operation, better filtration, quieter cycles, and a warranty that starts over.
We quote both paths in writing on the same visit. You should never have to decide based on a number a technician says out loud once.
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