Duct Cleaning FAQ: Air Ducts, Dryer Vents and Furnace Cleaning in Toronto

Air duct cleaning is the removal of dust, pet hair, lint and debris from the supply and return ducts that carry air between your furnace and every room. A proper job puts the system under negative pressure with a powerful vacuum, then brushes the duct surfaces so loosened debris is pulled out of the house. Comfort Clean uses truck-mounted equipment and cleans the duct runs themselves, not just the vent covers.

The technician first inspects the system and protects the floors around the furnace and registers. A truck-mounted vacuum is connected to the main duct to put the system under negative pressure. Each supply run is then brushed, along with every return run on the Comfort and Luxury packages, so debris breaks loose and is pulled back to the truck instead of into your rooms. Before-and-after photos are taken on every package, and on Luxury the blower compartment is cleaned and the ductwork is sanitized with Benefect, a natural product.

For a typical detached house, a full air duct cleaning takes about 2 to 4 hours. Condo suites and smaller homes take less time, while large homes with many vents, a finished basement or a second furnace take longer. A dryer vent cleaning on its own typically takes 45 to 90 minutes. We give you a time estimate when we confirm your booking by phone.

Yes. Most people stay home for the whole visit. The vacuum runs from the truck outside, so the noise inside is moderate, and because the system is under suction, dust is pulled out rather than blown into the rooms. Keep pets in a closed room, clear a path to the furnace and the vents, and expect the heating or cooling to be off while we work.

Industry guidance from NADCA suggests every 3 to 5 years for most homes, with the furnace and air handler inspected every year. Clean sooner after a renovation, when you move into a home with an unknown history, or if you have pets, smokers or allergy sufferers. No rule sets a fixed schedule, so base it on what you see inside the vents rather than on the calendar.

Look for grey buildup around the supply registers, dust settling on furniture soon after you clean, a musty or stale smell when the furnace or AC starts, and rooms that get weaker airflow than they used to. Renovation dust, signs of mice or insects, or a home where nobody knows when the ducts were last cleaned are also good reasons to book an inspection.

You can do useful upkeep yourself. Turn the system off, remove the register covers and wash them in warm soapy water, vacuum as far into each opening as your hose reaches, wipe the return grille and change the furnace filter. What you cannot reach is the trunk line and the branch runs deeper in the walls, which need professional negative-pressure equipment to clean without pushing dust further in.

Usually nothing dramatic at first, which is why many homes go years between cleanings. Over time, though, dust, pet hair and debris build up in the returns and on the blower, airflow drops, and more fine dust ends up on your furniture. In a neglected system you can also get musty smells, pests nesting in the ducts or mould where moisture gets in.

In most GTA homes with central air, the air conditioner uses the same ducts as the furnace, so there is no separate set of AC ducts to clean. One air duct cleaning covers both heating and cooling. The AC coil usually sits on top of the furnace, and AC coil cleaning is an additional service we can add to the visit, priced by quote. Refrigerant work and coil repairs are a job for a licensed HVAC technician.

We start with a quick inspection of the run, the transition hose behind the dryer and the outside hood. Then the dryer is pulled out and disconnected, and high-pressure air tools are run through the full line to drive the lint out through the exterior vent. We clear the hood and flap, reconnect the dryer and check that air is moving properly. Most homes take 45 to 90 minutes.

Empty the lint trap after every load and wash the screen now and then. A few times a year, unplug the dryer, pull it out, disconnect the transition hose and vacuum the hose, the outlet on the dryer and as much of the wall duct as you can reach. Outside, make sure the hood flap opens freely. Long runs, second-floor and attic vents and runs with several turns are best left to a professional.

For most homes, a professional dryer vent cleaning about once a year is a sensible schedule, and sooner if loads start taking longer to dry. Large families, long runs, second-floor or attic vents and dryers that run every day build up lint faster. A short, straight basement vent with light use can go a little longer. Clean the lint trap after every load either way.

The most common sign is clothes that need two cycles to dry. Others are a dryer or laundry room that feels unusually hot, a burning or musty smell, lint collecting around the outside hood, a flap that barely opens when the dryer runs, or a dryer that shuts off early from overheating. Any of those means the vent should be checked and cleaned before heavy use continues.

Lint is fine, dry and very flammable, and the dryer pushes hot air past it with every load. When the vent is restricted, heat builds up inside the dryer and the duct, and lint near the heating element can ignite. U.S. Fire Administration data lists failure to clean as the leading factor in residential clothes dryer fires, and dryer fires peak in January.

Dryer manufacturers recommend rigid metal duct for the run through the wall or ceiling. Never use plastic or vinyl. Flexible foil duct should only be used if your dryer’s manual specifically allows it, usually just for the short connection behind the machine. Keep the run as short and straight as possible, because every elbow reduces the maximum length the manual allows, and do not crush the hose against the wall.

Furnace cleaning is an additional service, priced by quote, that we add to the same visit as the ducts, because a dusty blower would push dirt straight back into freshly cleaned ductwork. The Luxury package at $499 already includes a clean of the furnace blower compartment, while the Basic package at $329 covers the supply side and the Comfort package at $399 the supply and return ductwork.

A forced-air system heats or cools your home by moving air through ducts. The furnace blower pulls air in through the return vents, passes it through the filter and across the burners or the AC coil, then pushes it out through the supply vents in each room. Most houses in the GTA use forced air, which is why the ducts and the furnace collect dust together.

CMHC advises checking your furnace filter every month during the heating season and cleaning or replacing it when it looks dirty. Basic one-inch filters often need replacing monthly, while thicker pleated filters last longer, so follow the label. Homes with pets, a renovation or wildfire smoke outside may need more frequent changes. A clean filter protects the blower and keeps more dust out of the ducts.

No. Comfort Clean cleans ducts, furnaces and dryer vents. We do not repair or replace furnace or AC parts, handle refrigerant, do gas work or issue safety certifications. If our technicians notice something that looks unsafe, such as a cracked part, heavy rust or a disconnected vent pipe, we point it out and photograph it so you can have a licensed HVAC technician look at it.

Late summer and fall are best, before the furnace starts running hard through the GTA heating season, roughly November to March. A clean system going into winter means better airflow from the first cold night. Spring is a good second choice, right after the heaviest use and before pollen season. The weeks after a renovation are also a good time, whatever the season.

Leave the house right away and do not use light switches, phones or anything that could make a spark inside. From outside or a neighbour’s home, call the Enbridge Gas 24/7 emergency line at 1-866-763-5427 or 911, and do not go back in until you are told it is safe. Ontario also requires working carbon monoxide alarms next to sleeping areas in homes with fuel-burning appliances.

Comfort Clean posts its prices: $329 for Basic, $399 for Comfort and $499 for Luxury, for homes in Toronto and across the GTA. Each package covers a typical home with up to 10 vents (15 on the Luxury package), and extra vents are $12 each. There is no trip fee inside our service area, and we confirm the total by phone before booking, so you know the number before anyone arrives.

For most GTA homes, cleaning the HVAC system means cleaning the ducts and the furnace together in one visit. With Comfort Clean the duct cleaning runs from $329 to $499 for a typical home with up to 10 vents (15 on the Luxury package), plus $12 per extra vent. Luxury includes the furnace blower compartment clean and sanitizing of the ductwork. Add-ons such as a full furnace cleaning, AC coil cleaning or dryer vent cleaning are priced separately, as is a second furnace.

Basic at $329 cleans the supply side: the connection to the furnace supply, the supply lines and the supply main. Comfort at $399 cleans both the supply and return sides, including the return lines and return main, plus the J-channel. Luxury at $499 adds a furnace blower compartment clean and sanitizing of the ductwork with Benefect, a natural product. Basic and Comfort cover up to 10 vents, Luxury up to 15, and all three include before-and-after photos.

Extra vents beyond the package count are $12 each. There is no trip fee inside our service area and no hourly billing. A second furnace or air handler is a separate system and is quoted separately, and dryer vent cleaning is priced on its own, from $280, whichever package you choose. We count your vents with you on the phone and confirm the total before booking.

Call 905-738-1878, 8am to 6pm, seven days a week, or send a request through our contact page. We serve Toronto and North York, York Region cities such as Vaughan, Richmond Hill, Markham, Newmarket and Aurora, and other GTA cities including Mississauga, Brampton, Oakville and Pickering. Our office is at 4949 Bathurst St, Unit 8, in North York, at Bathurst and Finch.

Register your home and mobile numbers with Canada’s National Do Not Call List, and ask any caller to remove you from their list. Do not book or give out your address on an unsolicited call, especially one offering a whole-house cleaning for a very low price, because those offers often grow once the crew is inside. A reputable company posts its prices and lets you call it.

Yes. In a condo suite we clean the in-suite supply and exhaust vents, the fan coil area and the dryer line, using compact equipment sized for a suite. We arrange the service elevator and access with your concierge or property manager before the visit. Because most suites have fewer vents than a house, many fall into our smallest package, and whole-building programs are quoted per suite.

In multi-unit buildings, responsibility usually sits with the property owner, landlord or condominium corporation, especially when dryers exhaust into shared risers or common ductwork. Suite owners are often responsible for the part inside their own unit, so check your condo declaration or lease. We clean single suites for owners and tenants and also run building-wide programs for property managers and condo boards.

Yes. We clean duct systems in offices, retail units, multi-unit residential buildings and other commercial spaces across Toronto and the GTA. Commercial jobs start with a walk-through so we can see the units, access points and duct layout, and they are quoted by project rather than by package. We also clean commercial dryer and laundry exhaust vents.

Usually, yes, with some planning. We schedule commercial work in the evenings, on weekends or in phases, one area or system at a time, so staff, tenants and customers can keep using the space. Work areas are protected while we clean, and photos of the completed work can be provided for your records or your property manager.

It is worth it when there is a real problem to fix: ducts clogged with dust, debris from a renovation, signs of rodents or insects, visible mould in hard-surface ducts, or a home whose history you do not know. The U.S. EPA does not recommend routine cleaning for every home, and a clean system with a good filter may not need it yet. We will tell you honestly which group you are in.

Duct cleaning has not been shown to prevent health problems, and we do not promise it will cure allergies. What it does is remove the settled dust, pet dander and debris that get stirred up and blown into rooms each time the system runs. Many households with pets or dust sensitivity notice less dust afterward. Pair it with a good filter that you check monthly through the heating season.

Not always. Sanitizing is an optional treatment applied after a proper mechanical cleaning, never instead of one. It makes the most sense when there is a lingering odour, after a pest problem, or once mould has been dealt with and the moisture source fixed. Our Luxury package includes sanitizing the ductwork with Benefect, a natural product; sanitizing is not sold separately.

We can clean mould growth from the inside of hard-surface metal ducts as part of a duct cleaning, but mould always comes from moisture, so the water problem has to be found and fixed first or it will come back. We do not do mould remediation of drywall, insulation or other building materials. If mould has spread beyond the ducts, a remediation specialist is the right call.

Usually, yes. Drywall sanding, flooring and demolition dust get pulled into the return air and keep circulating long after the work ends. CMHC guidance also notes that duct cleaning can make sense when you move into a newly built house, since construction debris is often left in the ducts. For a resale home, a first cleaning resets the system when you do not know its history.