I recently moved into a new house and during the inspection, the inspector noted that there was a fan in the attic space above the garage.
He also mentioned that I could probably just unplug it because they do not typically install them anymore now that houses have air conditioners because:
- The fan moves the hot air out of the attic area
- This pulls air from the main floor of the garage into the attic
- Which pulls the air-conditioned air out of the house and into the garage.
Thus making the air conditioner have to run more often. He said that they instead are now just putting vents in those areas.
Is this true? Are there other considerations I should take into account? The attic area is pretty nicely finished and will be used for storage of things we will use about once a year (mostly Christmas decorations). I do not think anything that would be stored there is super temperature sensitive.
Best Answer
Negative pressure in your garage is far more likely to be relieved through flimsy overhead door seals than from inside the adjacent home (presumably through the service door weather seals alone).
However, it's probably not doing you much economic good to have a fan running in the garage attic. What little energy you save conditioning your home (with its separate attic space) may be offset by the cost of the fan operation.
If your garage gets uncomfortably warm in the summer it may be worthwhile to run the fan. Otherwise, it's apparently not serving a purpose.