I am looking for a referral for company that can come blow in some fiberglass insulation into my attic in west Houston.

Going to jump on this thread too. Need a recommendation for roof replacement. Actually I need an attic cleaning with new insulation as well but I figure start with the roofer. In central Houston.

Couple of old recs here. Post on the HI board as well.

https://texags.com/forums/61/topics/2745051

Not sure of the details or if you even want it but our builder is upgrading us to foam insulation for free because he said blown in insulation has gotten more expensive recently.

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Not sure of the details or if you even want it but our builder is upgrading us to foam insulation for free because he said blown in insulation has gotten more expensive recently.

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The foam is good stuff IF it is properly installed. I'm guessing if a builder is doing it you would have a warranty anyways. There are some horror stories out there with companies incorrectly spraying the foam forcing people to have to cut off the entire top of their house. You can google it. Not trying to scare you, just make sure they use a legit company.

drumboy said:

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Not sure of the details or if you even want it but our builder is upgrading us to foam insulation for free because he said blown in insulation has gotten more expensive recently.

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I'd take that deal any day! Probably not actually cheaper for them but by the time they factor in all the additional steps taken to get a conventionally insulated house to meet energy codes today they probably come out close to even and with much less time involved.

IDaggie06 said:

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Not sure of the details or if you even want it but our builder is upgrading us to foam insulation for free because he said blown in insulation has gotten more expensive recently.

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The foam is good stuff IF it is properly installed. I'm guessing if a builder is doing it you would have a warranty anyways. There are some horror stories out there with companies incorrectly spraying the foam forcing people to have to cut off the entire top of their house. You can google it. Not trying to scare you, just make sure they use a legit company.

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Foam insulation in this climate is not good, your house needs to breathe.

Stay away from foam in this humidity!

We used MJ Insulation. I thought they were extremely fairly priced. They showed up on time and we're very polite and professional. In and out in about an hour and a half.

832-314-4458

Boats and Hose said:

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We used MJ Insulation. I thought they were extremely fairly priced. They showed up on time and we're very polite and professional. In and out in about an hour and a half.

832-314-4458

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Can you give me an indication of what they charged. I've only talked to one company so far and they were $1835 for a 2150 SF house. Seemed high.

+1 for MJ insulation. Cheaper than DIY and quick and professional.

Another + for MJ Insulation, Here was his proposal, under 1K, not sure on actual SF price

-Take down all R7 batts in attic knee walls and dispose
-Install R13 unfaced batts in attic knee walls and secure w/ strap
-Install R13 unfaced batts in some slopes that were missing
-Install R30(about 9/10 inches) fiberglass blow-in insulation over existing in all flat ceiling

Did this for me a month ago in west houston. I was surprised how cheap and fast they were. House built in '70, 2 story house 2900 SF needed some upgrades to insulation in attic. In and out in like 3 hrs. Had another quote from Williams insulation that was 3x this one.
Marc Rodriguez
MJ Insulation

Mine was very similar to what texagpilot said:

I'm in West Houston with a house built in 1966. I needed about 9 inches of insulation blown in to cover approx. 2300 sq. ft. They charged me $805 for that ($0.35/sq. ft). I also had them cover the recessed light canisters to prevent the insulation from touching them. All in, it was $855 (I also gave him and his team a tip). Marc was on site and very friendly and helpful. They laid down plastic on the floors to prevent a mess. It was one of the easier projects/upgrades that I've done.

For reference, I also had Garland Insulation come out and they quoted me $1,700 ($0.74/ sq. ft.). And I also weighed the costs of me doing it myself and for me, it didn't seem worth the extra $200 or so that I would have saved.

Hope this helps.

Thanks everyone. MJ seems like a no brainer.

Just left a vm for Marc

Make sure to request soffit baffles as well.

Cardiag said:

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Going to jump on this thread too. Need a recommendation for roof replacement. Actually I need an attic cleaning with new insulation as well but I figure start with the roofer. In central Houston.

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Did you ever get a roof contractor?

Payless Insulation

Nothing like a 2-year bump; had this thread bookmarked for future use.
Add one more for MJ Insulation. We called last week for an estimate and he came out the same day. After receiving his very reasonable estimate, we scheduled for them to come out today.

Mark and his crew just finished in our house in Sugar Land. They removed the batts over half of the cathedral ceiling, put up straps on the knee walls and added batts as needed. They also cleaned up all the old blown-in insulation and trash left by various electricians/HVAC/plumbing contractors and sealed around all the registers and header penetrations like cable and electrical. While they were sealing these areas they sprayed a disinfectant. Final step was to blow in 15" of fiberglass insulation. He had me inspect the attic after all the clean-up, sealing and disinfecting was finished and again after the insulation was blown in. HIs rate for clean-up was $1.00/sf and for the insulation was $0.85/sf. Ten years ago, after having a total AC system replacement, the contractor had an affiliate insulation company drop by for an estimate. That came in over four times what Mark charged us today.

We are very satisfied with the entire experience and appreciate the recommendations listed on here. Thanks TexAgs!

awesome. have actually been considering this. can you expand on the process (removal of old blown in?) and post a picture of the finished work?

Mike,
I haven't taken a picture of the finished job yet; I didn't carry my phone up when I looked it over. I'll try to get one later.
As for the removal, since it was more convenient to come in through one of the bedroom windows, closer to the attic ladder, they went in and out that way. The old blown-in was removed via the same machine they blew in the new product, via suction. It was captured in a large bag similar to an old vacuum bag that was porous enough to allow the air out but keep most of the dust in. You could hear them all over the house, using the vacuum to get in every crevice, and they covered it all twice to ensure they got everything. The old batt insulation was removed by hand.
I can't emphasize enough how professional Mark and his team are. He used a laser to take his measurements so they were accurate enough for me to trust him. They wore masks the entire time, put down plastic taped to the baseboards, cleaned up afterwards such that all we did was vacuum when the job was finished and picked only what we normally do with the vacuum. They even took the pictures off the wall in the hall and put them up in the same places; Mark told me his worker took photos of them to get everything back in the right order. The house is 42 years old and we can really tell the difference both in temperature and nose level. The old insulation had settled so much we had nearly nothing left up there and heard so much traffic and lawn equipment that the house now is almost eerily quiet. I haven't stopped smiling all day and my wife is nearly tired of me talking about it.
If you live in the greater Houston area and plan on getting insulation updated/replaced/installed, I can't recommend MJ insulation enough.
When he came out for the estimate I told him I had heard about him on Texags, and he said that he remembered getting some jobs off of the site a couple of years ago.

This is pertinent to me.

Awesome, so even very clean which was my largest concern honestly. Had wondered how much of it would be all over the house from the clean out process.

Absolutely. They treat your house as if it is their house. I don't think you will have any worries about clean up afterwards. I strongly recommend having the old insulation removed and getting the house sealed. We can already tell the difference in noise and comfort.
One caveat, however. After they left, my wife found some hardware in the driveway. It was probably left in the attic by the HVAC contractors when they replaced our system, and apparently spilled out of the vac system. There was a sheet-metal screw and a couple of washers. Fortunately we didn't drive over the screw. Just scan the area after they leave and you should be fine.

MelvinUdall said:

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IDaggie06 said:

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Not sure of the details or if you even want it but our builder is upgrading us to foam insulation for free because he said blown in insulation has gotten more expensive recently.

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The foam is good stuff IF it is properly installed. I'm guessing if a builder is doing it you would have a warranty anyways. There are some horror stories out there with companies incorrectly spraying the foam forcing people to have to cut off the entire top of their house. You can google it. Not trying to scare you, just make sure they use a legit company.

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Foam insulation in this climate is not good, your house needs to breathe.

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Insert trump wrong .gif here

Spray foam insulation is just fine in this area, but it must be properly installed and your HVAC system must be designed for the spray foam versus traditional batt or blown in insulation.

What happens is that if you switch over to spray foam and get better R values and better sealing of your house, if you don't actually downsize your HVAC unit, your current unit ends up being oversized. And that means that it runs inefficiently and doesn't run long enough to pull moisture out of the conditioned air - and you get humidity and mold problems over the long term as a result.

Your average residential installer isn't going to do it correctly. We aren't known in our for having the most trained installers.

If you get blown-in insulation be careful that the "installers" allow for airflow from any soffit vents up into the attic. I'm waiting for the weather to cool down some more so I can go troubleshoot/correct the crap-tastic insulation job originally done in my attic. It has blown-in insulation, but so far I've noticed only a single baffle installed to provide a gap through the insulation for air flow from the soffit up into the attic. Everywhere else it looks like they just blew insulation up against the roof decking and called it good. if there is any airflow at all it would be an accident. I'm hoping a lot of it hasn't fallen down onto the soffit vents which will be even harder to remove.

That was something I specifically looked for during the post-installation inspection and MJ Insulation did leave space at the soffits for air flow.

MJ didn't install soffit baffles ?

No, they didn't. They "feathered" the insulation towards the outer walls. Whatever they put is was way more than was there already. I suppose you could ask them about installing baffles. It may not be that much more, since they are crawling around vacuuming out the old insulation and sealing the seams/vents/fixtures.

Feel bad I never followed up. Mark did an amazing job for me. The clean out was thorough and clearly did a great job with insulation. Have since sold that home and the buyer's inspection specifically noted good attic insulation for a 1912 house.

Just a follow-up for anyone in the Houston area, if you felt the cold more than you expected and want to upgrade your insulation, I strongly recommend MJ Insulation, as stated earlier on this thread. A top notch company that will do you right.

We just had a new roof put on by Church Roofing and Remodeling. We were very happy with them.

I see my old thread was bumped.

I ended up using MJ Insulation...would very highly recommend them.

I also happened to have my siding replaced 2 weeks ago. Used M&M Siding. They crushed it. They were the lowest bid of 3 contractors and couldn't have been happier. Founds some unexpected issues doing my 1968 house and they fixed everything without even asking and no up charge. Quality work. They said they recently moved to a referral model instead of advertising, so if you ask them for a free quote, tell them Brent off of Pinesap sent you.

Sorry if I missed this, how much does something like this run including removal of the old stuff?