Best Windows for California Home Owners (2021)

You're wanting a window that is able to beat the heat and also combat against cold. Hey guys, Sean with American Window Concepts here. And today I wanna talk a little bit about California homeowners and the best windows that are for California residences. There's a lot of options that you can choose from here in California. We are based in Ventura, California, which is right next to the beach. Very, very mild climate. Summers get to about 85 degrees and the winters get to about 50 degrees. So, I mean, it's actually a really, really chill place. But there are certain areas in California that are like the desert, for instance. You got mountain areas. There's all kinds of valleys, things of that nature. Northern California has very cold climate. So you gotta have the right kind of windows for these different areas. The thing I like to tell people, depending on who I'm selling to and what their location is, they basically have to package a window that is based for their area. So if they live in an extremely hot area like the desert, then what I would like to preach to them basically is that they need to get a very, very high grade of low E. You wanna do a very high grade of vinyl. You don't wanna use anything that's going to break down quickly over time. And some windows that you can get are gonna have poor quality vinyl. It's gonna be cost-effective. It'll take care of the job. It'll do it for a while, but then it'll start to break down. And you'll see that probably within a couple of years. Being in a desert area, you would wanna make sure that you're getting windows that are going to be able to hold up against that heat and also gets cold out there too. So you wanna make sure that you have a window package that will take care of the cold as well. And everybody out in that area typically has an air conditioning unit. And so the purpose of these windows would be to be able to combat that heat gain through the summertime. And then when it's cold outside, you don't wanna have to run the heater constantly. And then your bill is astronomical in the summer and in the winter. So the point of the window is to beat that and make the home feel so much more comfortable. Opposite of the desert, we have our coastal areas of California. And again, we've got a nice mild climate all the way from Northern California, all the way to Southern California, San Diego. They have a very, very nice temperature basis, not a huge fluctuation there. The windows that you're gonna wanna get there, we have strong sun in the coastal areas, but we don't have dramatic heat. But the sun, as it's hitting your house on a specific side, it really does heat up. And oh, by the way, we don't really have much air conditioning and heating, especially air conditioning. Most houses around here don't have air conditioning. So the way to combat that is you gotta package up your roof with solar abilities to break away the heat gain. Your windows are huge. It's the weakest link of your house. Always know that, that the windows are going to be the weakest link. So whenever it comes to a green house, windows are gonna be one of the biggest things you actually can do. So whenever you're dealing with a coastal style installation, again, it's gonna be, what style of window are you looking for? What is the budget? What's most important to you? Safety, because not all windows are created equal. But with coastal, you're not gonna really need anything. So as far as like triple glaze, you're not gonna need anything like that because that's really like sub freezing areas. You're not gonna get that around here. And then you're looking for things that are high and low E efficiency. So at least low E3, low E4 if it's available, and G340 if you have a south facing exposed area, especially where there's a pool or something like that, you definitely wanna go with a extremely high grade of low E argon gas standard. You're gonna wanna have that. If you're living in the Valley area, we're talking like Fresno, Clovis area, Visalia, all up to Sacramento. Sacramento being the kind of the head of the area, you're wanting a window that is able to beat the heat and also combat against cold because it does get cold there. It does get into the freezing temperatures and you wanna have a window package that will take care of that. The windows that we use, we have the option to do a very, very high grade of low E like the G340. And then we can also do an interior pyrolytic coating that goes on the interior of the glass and is gonna keep warmth inside. It traps it basically. So when it's really, really cold outside, you turn on that heater for a little bit and it really heats up the house and it traps it inside. So the heater really isn't running very often at all, but if you were to go outside, you can feel the temperature change. But when you go back inside the house, you can feel how warm it stays and the unit isn't continually running. And that's a really, really nice feature. Northern California, same thing. You're gonna definitely wanna have windows that can beat the heat because areas like north of like Reading, place like that, it still gets warm. It doesn't get dramatically hot, but it definitely gets warm up there, but it gets really cold. So you wanna make sure you have all the windows packaged to be able to combat against both. Vinyl is a great, great insulator. It doesn't transfer heat, cold, or sound. Fiberglass, being more expensive, has a few more options for colors and things like that. But that's a great insulator as well. Vinyl doesn't expand or contract as much as vinyl does, but it's a great, great solution. So these are things that you wanna keep in mind if you're in California, depending on what area you live in. Mountain areas, if you have a dual pane glass unit, it's gonna expand and contract as you're driving it up the mountains. So you're gonna wanna make sure that whoever's ordering your windows orders breather tubes in the IG unit itself. The only problem is, it's not gonna have argon gas between. So if somebody says that, oh, it'll still have argon gas, it's not true. So what you're gonna wanna do is you're gonna wanna make sure that the glass itself has the pyrolytic coating on the interior, as well as high grades of low E, whatever it is that you're looking for on the outside. If it snows, things like that in your areas, which most mountain regions do, you're gonna wanna have the ability to have a very high-performing window on the heat side and on the cool side. Breather tubes are probably gonna be suggested anything over 3,000 feet. So if you live above that, you're gonna have breather tubes so you won't have argon gas, but you'll have a great pyrolytic coating on the interior, and then you're gonna have your low E coating on the outside. So talk to your window dealers, ask them questions, make sure that they cover all the things that you're looking for, and then you go ahead and make your purchase. If you live in the Ventura, Santa Barbara, West LA area, and you're in need of some new vinyl windows, and you would be interested in an estimate, just reach out to us, go to our website, scroll down, click the request for a quote, and then we'll respond to you in about 24 hours. Thank you so much. Hey guys, thanks again for watching this video. If you wanna be kept updated on new videos that are coming out, just hit that like button and subscribe to the channel. Thank you so much.