r/WaterSofteners

Hello, me and my girlfriend are 19&20 respectively and just bought our first house in February. Anyways, we have hard water, and my gf went to Home Depot and they happened to be handing out free tests of water. So my girlfriend calls me tells me that some guy is gonna come out to TEST our water and it’ll take 30 mins tops. I don’t think much about it till he comes.

Turns out, they weren’t testing your water scientifically, and just straight up giving a sales pitch for their filtration and water softener. Also for context I recently graduated with a degree in design engineering from college.

Anyways he comes, and does his whole speech about how much money it’ll save and stuff, read other Reddit posts for their speeches. We get to the end, which took TWO HOURS and I was expecting a price of around 2k. He hits us with a 10k price, and I started questioning him.

Due to my engineering background, I started questioning the actual design of the softer, and how much it costs to manufacture to be 10k. He kept on repeating and repeating to me that it had to do with all of the “technology” inside of the filters. I then proceeded to point out that the replacement filters were only 60$ each, to which he said that I know nothing about the engineering behind it. Literally graduating 2 weeks before this guy came, I started arguing back at him, disproving his points. He kept on going back to the “technology inside of it” and “lifetime insurance.” He was also getting rowdy back at me, arguing that he knows more than I do because of his $800,000 house even though he is 30 years older than me.

This guy was using super high pressure sales tactics, and somehow his boss magically gave us 3k off. I ended up kicking the guy out. Keep in mind, I didn’t know what a water softener costs at this point in time, I just knew that the manufacturing for that much seems fishy. Turns out, to buy one is around 500-1000$, and WAY cheaper maintenance.

Anyways, I feel as if this is a super scummy and scammy way to do business as a company, and my girlfriend would’ve fallen for it if I wasn’t there to point out the obvious flaws. Stay smart and do research, was just wondering also if other people had similar issues with them.

First time poster but I am looking for advice (and venting a little)

So I know someone that has a Kinetico Premium-series system installed about 14-15 years ago and got an additional uplflow carbon filter 2 years ago. The head unit on the system broke and started spewing water so the system is on bypass now. Here is the crazy part...The local service contractor wants to charge about $6k to replace the main system. I ... like.. whaaaaaat? Like whhhhuuuuuuuuuaaaaaaaaaattttt?

I don't know if it is the seals or if the head unit needs to be rebuilt but like a seal job is certainly less than $1k and a rebuilt head unit can't be more than something like $1k, right? What is the thing made of? Gold? I see no gold.

Is Kinetico known for being a jack*** company? I can't even find a direct line to customer support - I tried calling and got routed to an outsourced dispatch team. That is pure caca. 💩

So, what is your advice? I will pass that advice along. Do you think it is worth trying to find a head unit on eBay or whatever?

Currently have a rented softener from Ecowater that they want $1200 to buy out or continue to rent for $30/month, which seems absurd. I'd prefer to buy one around the $500 range and would appreciate some opinions. I'd also like to know if the install would be easy considering we already have one hooked up. Any specialty tools required?

We just have 1 1/2 baths, so I don't think we need a huge one.

We recently moved into a house with a water softener system. It’s supposed to cycle every 12 days. In reality sometimes it’s 12 days but also has been happening 10 days, 14 days. Is this normal?

We have an AOSmith cabinet type softener that’s somewhere between 4 and 5 years old.

Maybe a month ago pressure began falling in the house. I know it’s the softener because as soon as it goes in bypass pressure returns to normal.

Can it be repaired or is replacement the only option? Thanks in advance.

I come from the Restoration world; fire, water, smoke, and mold damage. I have gained a lot of experience selling to homeowners and Property Management, managing jobs, estimating, etc.

I want to break off and start an Exterior Cleaning Company, the typical; driveways, roofs, siding, gutters etc.

I want to start lean, prove the concept. I want to be lean enough to run it out of my ford ranger until I taste some stress of minimal equipment.

What do I need to get started and knock out soft wash + pressure wash + gutters?

Please guide me any way you can :)

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I saw this on a video, anything cheaper or better?

Hosa CAIG Laboratories D5S-6 CAIG DeoxIT Contact Cleaner

Is this the best option? The whirlpool has everything combined together and moisture does get up there by the circuit board

I'm hoping to get the Best Shower head Filter possible.

Previously I had Hello Klean which was okay, but lacked pressure and broke easily (I'm UK based)

Would anyone have any recommendations on what I should buy?

Any advice is greatly appreciated!

Need to replace our Kenmore softener that was installed in the house before we purchased it. Not sure how old it is but it definitely leaks a lot of water when recharging!

Is Kenmore still a good brand?