The average life of a water heater relative to its amount of use, water quality and several other factors is 7-14 years. There is a good chance that there are other problems in your plumbing system if your replacement cycle on water heaters is occuring more frequently than that.

 

 

 

 I had a customer call me last week with a leaking water heater. After asking some of the basic questions (gas or electric, size, location and age), it became obvious to me that there was a problem that wasn't being addressed. They did have a water softener for their electric water heater which makes a huge difference in terms of longevitiy. Their water pressure was under 80 PSI as I found out later, but they didn't have a thermal expansion tank (next article). The previous plumber who had been replacing water heaters for all of those years never addressed this, he just kept replacing the water heaters as they failed. Good for his business, but costing the customer a small fortune in the process!

 

I don't believe in extended warranties for water heaters, but explain to customers that there are options to making a water heater last longer if they are willing to make that investment.