Do You Really Need Climate Controlled Storage?

Texas is well known for its heat and humidity. Climate controlled storage units make your items last longer than traditional storage units. We’ve been working with customers in the Kingwood area for years, and we have had a good number of people who've returned after a summer wishing they had rented a climate controlled storage unit. Not everyone needs a climate-controlled storage unit. Sometimes, it makes sense to upgrade. The trick is knowing when you need it versus when you're fine with a regular unit.

After helping hundreds of folks figure this out, we’ve developed some knowledge about when climate control is worth the money and when it can be skipped.

Texas Weather

If you've lived in the Kingwood area, you know what we're talking about. Summers that feel like you're living inside a hair dryer, and the area also gets random cold snaps out of nowhere. Your storage unit experiences all of this, just like everything else.

Regular storage units become similar to outdoor sheds. They get very stuffy when it's hot, cold when the temperature drops, and humid when it rains. Which is fine for some stuff, but it can possibly damage your belongings. We’ve seen family photos turned into one big stuck-together mess, guitars with necks that twisted like pretzels, and leather furniture that cracks. Depending on the storage facility, climate-controlled units usually stay around 70-75 degrees year-round and keep humidity levels steady. It's similar to keeping your stuff in your living room instead of your garage. 

When You Absolutely Need Climate Control

Some items are just asking for trouble if you put them in a regular storage unit here in Texas. We learned this the hard way, watching customers deal with damaged belongings.

Electronics are one of the best items of concern. These items hate humidity and temperature swings. We watched someone lose an expensive sound system because moisture got into the components over winter. The repair estimate was more than buying new equipment.

Wooden furniture will betray you if you're not careful. Solid wood expands and contracts with temperature changes, and too much humidity can cause warping, cracking, or joints coming apart. We’ve seen dining room sets that looked fine going in and came out looking like they belonged in a haunted house.

Birth certificates, tax records, and family photos, get damaged by humidity, you can't undo it. Explaining to the IRS that your tax documents have mold while in storage. Musical instruments are expensive as well. Guitars, violins, pianos, and wood instruments will warp, crack, or go out of tune permanently. 

When You Can Skip the Climate Control

Not everything needs the premium treatment, and honestly, some storage places will try to convince you that everything needs climate control. That's just not true.

Tools and lawn equipment handle temperature just fine. Items like hand tools and car parts. Most of these items are built to live outside anyway. Save your money and put them in a regular storage unit.

Sports equipment and outdoor gear usually does fine too. Items like bikes, camping gear, patio furniture, and grills. They're designed to handle weather, so storage temperature changes won't hurt them.

Non-wooden furniture like metal chairs, plastic storage containers, and synthetic materials generally don't care about temperature. If it's already designed to live outside or in an unheated garage, it'll be fine in regular storage.

Holiday decorations typically handle regular storage just fine. Christmas lights, plastic ornaments, and artificial trees survive a Texas summer.

The In-Between Cases That Trip People Up

This is where it gets tricky, and where we see people make expensive mistakes.

Upholstered furniture is one of those gray areas. A fabric couch might be okay in a regular storage unit if it's well-ventilated and you're not storing it through multiple summers. But leather? Get the climate control. Leather and Texas humidity do not play nice together.

Books and magazines depend on how long you're storing them. A few months in a regular unit? Probably fine.

Clothing is another tricky one. Regular clothes in plastic bins with tight lids usually do okay. But anything delicate, expensive, or sentimental should go in climate control.

The Cost

Climate-controlled storage units typically cost about $30-50 more per month than regular units, depending on size. That adds up, so you need to think about what you're protecting.

If you're storing $500 worth of stuff, paying an extra $50 a month for climate control doesn't make financial sense. But if you've got $5,000 worth of furniture and electronics, that monthly fee is basically insurance that pays for itself if it prevents damage.

We always tell customers to add up the replacement value of everything they're storing. If the extra cost of climate control for a year is less than 10% of what you'd pay to replace everything, it's probably worth it.

What We Actually Recommend at Northpark Storage

Here at Northpark Storage & Business Center on 1701 Northpark Dr, we're not going to pressure you into climate control if you don't need it.

We've got both regular and climate-controlled storage units because different situations call for different solutions. Our climate control storage units maintain temperature and humidity year-round, which matters in this Texas heat and humidity.

We are familiar with this area, what the weather does to stored items, how long people typically need storage, and what kinds of damage we see when people guess wrong about climate control. Sometimes it's better to spend more upfront than deal with replacing damaged belongings later.