Portable Air Conditioning Units, Because This Weather is Ridiculous

As I write this post it’s currently 95 degrees outside my home with a heat index of 105 degrees, needless to say I can see where the appeal of a portable air-conditioner exists, especially since it’s apparently a cheaper way to cool your home, even if not as powerful as other units.

As the name of these units suggest, users are able to move the air-conditioning units around their homes, circumventing the old practice of mounting a unit in a window, making the process of moving and remounting the unit a hassle.

One big advantage? You can cool your living room during the day as you watch TV or just hang out in your home and then move the unit into your bedroom right before bed, cooling down different rooms in your home without needing to cool the entire house at one time, saving you money on hot days.

While not as strong as household and window units the devices come in a variety of sizes from 8,000-10,000 Btu units for 250 square foot rooms to 14,000 Btu’s for slightly larger spaces.

Buyers should keep in mind that these units are more quite than window units but also typically weight 75-80 pounds which might not make them an ideal gift for grandma or grandpa unless they have hardwood floors and you buy a unit with wheels.

If mounting air conditioning units in various windows in your home is not an option, portable air conditioning units might be a better option for your needs, in the meantime when temperatures are hitting over 100 degrees in many parts of the country during a record hot summer, it might be worth investing in a whole house or window based systems.

The systems, which plug into standard electrical outlets can range in cost from $299 to $499, making them more expensive in many cases than a single window unit, but when you don’t need to buy different units for different rooms it’s not a bad option.