We have a well with very hard water. I have had two quotes from national companies (Culligan, etc) and we are now trying to decide going this route vs. trying to save some money and purchasing one through Lowe's, etc. Any advice from someone who may have one out there? Thanks!
We went to Lowes and bought one. Put it in the same room as the hot water heater. Inside water filters through it before it goes in the water tank. We buy salt and fill it up when it's time. No other issues in over 25 years.
we've got one in the basement that we've never hooked up in the 16 years we've been here. our water is as hard as ted cruz's heart but delicious as the waters of elysium. i'm fine with staying on top of the hard water residue and taking extra steps to clean my laundry. adding a bunch of salt to our water just didn't make sense to me.
khairete
S.
We own one. It was in the house when my husband bought the house. One advantage to renting would be if something goes wrong they would do the repairs. In the long run it is probably cheaper to buy. Ours is 17 years old and we've never had problems.
We're on well water and we got our system from Culligan in 2007.
We have a salt bin, a filter and a chlorine tank - and an under the sink reverse osmosis filter system in the kitchen (which we use for all our drinking/cooking/ice making purposes).
We're very happy with it!
i am married to an ex culligan man. and would go that route. yes its expensive but it will last long enough to get your moneys worth. when a system from lowes breaks down there is not much to be done but replace it. if a culligan goes down their service man (what my dh did) will come to you, fix the machine and you should get anothet 10+ years out of it. the harder the water the faster the system will wear out. one from lowes may last 5 if your lucky. but one from culligan will give you 10 years minimum most machines that dh was working on were at least 20 years old and some were 30 or more. so you get what you pay for.
We have done both - rent (from Culligan) and then we bought. I am glad we did buy, personally. Renting wasn't a big deal - it is an expense, but not out of this world. However, we did buy one at the state fair and got a really good deal. In fact, we took it with us when we moved and still have it to this day (which would make it 15 yrs old this August). I cannot function without a softener - our water is so hard it literally would ruin many items in our home (washer, dishwasher, faucets, toilets, tub/shower nozzles, etc.) if we didn't have one. Plus, if it accidentally runs out of salt, we know right away - you can't even get your shampoo to lather.
I don't know that I would buy one from Lowes/Menards/Home Depot - I liked that we purchased from a company that we could actually call, that only sold softener systems. We also liked the fact that we received a lifetime warranty on ours. I don't know if big box store ones have that kind of warranty. Plus, if something did go wrong, the store would just direct you to call the manufacturer, who you would likely have to deal with on the phone. Ours, we know that a live person would come to our home if we had a problem.
Maybe rent one from Culligan until you can find the one that you want/can afford/has the right warranty - that is what we did.
Good luck!
Yes, we had a water softener in Phoenix. I think we bought it but I'm not sure. It made a big difference when doing laundry and taking baths. Before we got the full house water softener we made do with a reverse osmosis set up in the kitchen because our water tasted awful.
I've had Culligan and loved it!...until it needed repairs. It was expensive to have Culligan repairman come and get things fixed and working again. It was around 10 years old at the time.
We went with Culligan years ago. From about 1997 until we sold our house and moved in 2005. The first few years were ok. About year 4 or so, it just became a routine issue to have to call them every few months for repairs. It was a pain in the rear and expensive to boot. We set up this home to do reverse osmosis but never hooked it up. It's ok, and I miss having softened water (ours is very hard and the white clothes get grungy grey quickly) but I wouldn't go with Culligan again. Probably less expensive to buy a unit from a store.
