Agent Offfers
Realty Times TV

How to Choose a Water Filter System for Your New Home

Posted On Wednesday, 02 October 2024 15:07
How to Choose a Water Filter System for Your New Home Image source: 123RF

Building a new home is an exciting venture, with the chance to create your own ideal habitat. Including a water filtration system in your plans while building will give you maximal creativity for incorporating any number of different water filtration technologies or systems into your budding domicile. We’ll go over some of the most important things to consider when it comes to water filtration systems, and what to consider when incorporating one into your new home.

The Importance of Clean and Safe Water in a New Home

Water is the stuff of life, and even if you live in an area with decent municipal water, there is no reason not to go the extra mile and install some home filtration, because water quality is an ever-changing thing. Water quality is not static, in other words, but dynamic. It can change due to a myriad of factors, from shifting weather patterns to new industrial projects, manufacturing plants, or construction projects putting waste into the soil and water table, water line breaks, lead pipe leaching, and so on. If you are investing in a new home, invest in peace of mind against problematic water at the same time.

How to Assess Your Water Quality

To determine your current water quality, you can search online for the most recent federally mandated water quality report for your area. As noted above, water conditions change, so be sure to check each new year’s report when it becomes available. For specific information on the water coming out of your taps, you can mail a sample into a laboratory for testing for around $100.

Types of Water Filters

There are many types of water filters, with some of the most important and common options being sediment filters to remove physical particulate like dust, dirt, and clay), activated carbon filters to remove chlorine and dissolved chemicals in water, and reverse osmosis membranes to remove nearly everything. Sediment and carbon filters are used everywhere, from refrigerator filters to city treatment plants. Reverse osmosis is a more aggressive form of filtration, but comes with the costs of producing water very slowly, and producing around 3 gallons of waste water for every gallon of pure water produced.

Key Factors to Consider When Choosing a Water Filter

First, determine what is in your water, and how serious the contaminant levels are. For many common problems, a combination of sediment and carbon filtration will be adequate. If chlorine or other chemical levels are high, you can add additional carbon filters. If you want the cleanest water possible, go for a multi-stage RO system, which will always have sediment and carbon filters as the initial stages before the RO membrane. Look for a system with an alkaline remineralizing cartridge after the RO, as the membrane will remove nearly all dissolved solids, including the healthful minerals that make water taste good.

Choosing the Right Size and Capacity

Depending on the type of system you are getting, you may need to get a certain proprietary brand or filter (for, e.g., a refrigerator with a built-in water filter slot), but for an under sink or whole-house filtration system, go for a system that produces enough water for your needs. Talk to your plumber or water dealer about flow rates and gallons per day, as well as the size of your home and family to determine the system for you.

Additional Features to Consider

Do you want a whole-house system, or a point-of-use system that only treats your drinking water? For whole-house systems, a water softener makes a great choice, as it protects your pipes and fixtures against limescale, and makes showering better and laundry softer.

Installation and Maintenance Tips

For a big, whole-house system, you will be best off hiring a plumber or other professional installer. Water damage is costly, and point-of-entry installs often involve cutting pipes and welding or soldering new joints. Unless you have those skills, don’t attempt it yourself. By contrast, most DIY’ers should be able to handle an under sink RO installation with little trouble.

Common Mistakes to Avoid When Choosing a Water Filter

Don’t go for the most expensive system, simply because it has the most features. There is no such thing as “the best water filter.” The “best” water filter is always and only the one that treats the problems with your water as cheaply and effectively as possible. Expensive, top-of-the-line systems will likely do that, but you may be able to get results just as good with something far cheaper, depending on your water conditions. Know your water, and choose based on that.

Conclusion

There are plenty of options out there, but don’t be intimidated; get to know your local water conditions, do some research on available systems, and talk to a local water dealer about the most popular systems in the area, and what they recommend. Tried and tested options like sediment, carbon, and RO can usually get most jobs done between the three of them, and water softeners are a great option for the whole home. Ultimately, the best water filtration system is the one that gets you the results you are looking for.

Rate this item
(0 votes)
More in this category: > How to Keep Your Outdoor Space Clean and Tidy Why Dividend Investing?
back to top

Agent Resource

Before You List

Today's Headlines

Realty Times

From buying and selling advice for consumers to money-making tips for Agents, our content, updated daily, has made Realty Times® a must-read, and see, for anyone involved in Real Estate.

Links

Sections

Search

Joomla! Debug Console

Session

Profile Information

Memory Usage

Database Queries