Spray foam insulation in San Luis AZ - a sealed attic that keeps the upstairs cooler

Most people call us about a hot room upstairs, the room over the garage or a power bill that won't come down, and foam is one answer to that, not the only one. The price moves with the size of the space, the foam type and thickness, how hard the attic is to get into, and whether old insulation has to come out first through insulation removal. The schedule turns on that removal, whether the city wants a permit and the time the product needs before you can come back inside. You get your own number from the estimate, after I've looked at the attic in person.

I start by asking about asthma, allergies or past reactions in the house, because that decides whether I suggest foam at all. If foam fits, we pick open-cell or closed-cell and plan the day you'll be out of the home around the product we use. On spray day the crew pulls out any soaked or dirty old material and does the air sealing, closing gaps around can lights, pipes and the hatch, so nothing gets sealed in that should have come out. Then we spray, keeping the edges as full as the middle, since thin coverage at the edges is where heat sneaks in. Some foams need a covering such as a coating or drywall, depending on the product or the code, and we'll tell you before the job if yours does. When we're done, I'll remind you to tell any plumber or electrician working near the foam later not to heat it or grind it, because that can release harmful fumes from foam that's otherwise settled down.

Foam costs more than other options, and it seals air while it insulates. In a lot of houses, sealing the gaps and topping up with blown-in insulation, loose fill blown through a hose, usually makes more sense for the money. The exception is when your ducts and AC equipment live up there, and that's when foam under the roof deck earns its price. Either way, we look at the job as attic insulation first and decide on the material after that.

Under Arizona law, someone without a contractor license can only take casual or minor work under $1,000 total, labor and materials together, and that exemption ends where the job needs a local building permit. So check that whoever sprays your attic holds a contractor license. The City of San Luis builds to the International Residential Code and the International Energy Conservation Code. Before we start, we check with the building office in the city where your house is, and if a permit is needed, we pull it and set up the inspections. If you'd rather ask yourself, the city's building inspections office takes calls at 928 341-8564.

Most of what we see here is hot rooms and high bills, and plenty of the attics we open have ducts running through them, old insulation packed down thin at the edges or a hatch nobody ever sealed. We find the same mix on jobs in Somerton and Yuma, and we work the cities around them too.