The Free Air Check is a no-cost, in-home look at the air, temperature and airflow in one child's room.
We come to your home in the South Bay, Westside or Beverly Hills, spend time in the room your child sleeps in, take readings where your child actually is, look at what your existing system does and doesn't do for that room, and tell you plainly what — if anything — needs doing. It is not a laboratory test, and it is not a sales appointment. You can search Google for "indoor air quality testing Los Angeles" and find a dozen labs and inspectors; none of them will stand in a nursery and tell you why the crib corner is four degrees warmer than the hallway. That is the job this page describes.
Five things, in the room, in this order. Each one answers a question a parent has already asked us on the Air Check form.
| What we look at | How | Why it matters in a child's room |
|---|---|---|
| Temperature at crib height | A reading taken where your child sleeps, plus the thermostat reading for comparison. | A thermostat on a hallway wall reports the hallway. An upstairs corner room in a 1960s Torrance or Mar Vista house can sit several degrees off that number by 2 a.m., and the crib is in the corner, not the hallway. |
| Relative humidity | A hygrometer reading in the room, noted against the EPA's guidance to keep indoor humidity below 60% and ideally between 30% and 50%. | Too dry and the room feels harsh; too damp and condensation forms on the inside of the window. The reading tells us which direction the room leans and whether a humidifier or the system itself is the reason. |
| Airflow and filtration | Which supply serves the room, whether it's a vent or a mini split head, what filter is in the path and what rating it carries. | The EPA states that ductless mini splits generally do not filter fine particles — the screen inside the head exists to keep lint off the coil. If that screen is the only filtration in the room, that is the single most useful thing the Air Check will tell you. |
| The existing system | Type, age, whether the room has its own zone or is the last stop on a whole-house system. | A nursery added to a multi-zone system as a "lonely head" behaves differently from a single-zone room with its own compressor. We explain why in our explainer on how mini splits work in a child's room. |
| Sources in the room | Humidifier type and water used, floor covering, new furniture, window exposure, and what the outside air does during Santa Ana wind and smoke episodes. | The EPA notes that ultrasonic and impeller ("cool mist") humidifiers can disperse minerals from tap water into the air, and that the young may be particularly susceptible to airborne pollutants. A white film on the dresser is that mineral dust. It's a two-minute fix once someone points it out. |
At the end you get the readings, what they mean for this room, and one of three answers: it's fine, it needs a small change, or it needs a designed solution. If it's the third, we write the scope down before we talk about money.
Most of the results for "air quality testing near me" in Los Angeles are environmental labs and mold inspectors. They do real work, and it isn't this work. Here is the honest comparison.
| Little Lungs Free Air Check | Lab-based indoor air quality test | Consumer air monitor | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Who does it | An HVAC professional, in the room | An environmental inspector or a mail-in kit, analysed by a laboratory | You, with a device on the shelf |
| What it measures | Temperature and humidity where the child sleeps; airflow, filtration, zoning and in-room sources | Specific contaminants — mold spores, asbestos fibres, radon, formaldehyde and other VOCs — from physical samples | Continuous PM2.5, CO₂, humidity, sometimes VOCs; no interpretation |
| What you get | A plain-language answer and, if needed, a written scope for the room | A lab report with concentrations against reference levels | A number on a screen, and a graph |
| Cost | $0, no obligation | Priced per sample by the lab or inspector | Purchase price of the device |
| Best when | The room won't hold a temperature, feels stuffy, gathers dust fast, or you're setting up a nursery and want it right first time | You suspect a specific problem — visible mold, water damage, an older home with possible asbestos, a radon concern | You want to watch trends over weeks after the causes are already understood |
If we see or smell something that needs a lab, we tell you on the spot. We don't sell that service and we don't subcontract it. What we do is the part the lab report doesn't cover: how to make one room hold the right temperature, the right humidity and cleaner-feeling air, quietly, every night.
Whole-house HVAC is designed around the whole house. A child's room is one room with one occupant who can't get up and open a window. The two problems are not the same size, and they don't have the same answer.
Little Lungs sizes equipment with an ACCA Manual J load calculation run for the single room — its orientation, its glass, its insulation, its ceiling — rather than a rule of thumb per square foot. That is the difference between a room that holds 70°F on a September evening in Manhattan Beach, when the coast is at its hottest, and a room that overshoots, short-cycles and never quite settles. The Air Check is where that calculation starts, because the readings we take are its inputs. What a properly sized single-room system costs in Los Angeles is covered in our cost guide, with dated sources.
The Air Check form asks why you're reaching out. That answer sets the emphasis of the visit.
| You selected | What we weight |
|---|---|
| Preparing a nursery | Sizing for the room before anything is bought; new-furniture and paint off-gassing; a humidity plan for the first winter; where the crib goes relative to the supply air. |
| Newborn or infant room | Overnight temperature stability at crib height; humidifier type and water; sound level of whatever is running in the room. |
| Asthma or allergies | Designed for families managing allergies: what filtration is in the room's air path and what rating it carries, humidifier mineral dust, dust reservoirs like carpet and upholstered furniture. We look at the air handling; your paediatrician looks after your child. |
| General indoor air quality | A full source walk of the room and the two rooms that share air with it, plus what the house does on a smoke or Santa Ana day. |
| HVAC / temperature concerns | The room that won't hold a temperature: zoning, the "lonely head" problem, duct runs, and whether the room is under- or over-supplied. |
The Free Air Check is step one of three. Nothing in steps two and three happens without a written scope and your go-ahead.
We evaluate the child's room, the existing HVAC, filtration, comfort, humidity and the indoor air environment, and give you the readings and a plain answer.
If the room needs it, a combination of climate control, filtration and air purification designed around this room and this child — sized, not guessed, and quoted in writing first.
We verify the completed environment against the scope we wrote at step two, so the room you were promised is the room you get.
Little Lungs works with leading manufacturers including Mitsubishi Electric and Aerus Air Scrubber Plus. Pricing for any recommended work follows the Air Check; we do not quote from a phone call.
These are areas we serve, not office locations. If you're just outside them, ask — the answer is usually yes.
Manhattan Beach, Hermosa Beach, Redondo Beach, Torrance, Palos Verdes Estates, Rancho Palos Verdes, El Segundo.
Common here: the upstairs nursery in a 1950s–70s tract home on a single zone, and beach-city additions with no ductwork at all.
Santa Monica, Venice, Mar Vista, Culver City, Brentwood, Pacific Palisades, Marina del Rey, Playa Vista.
Common here: pre-war bungalows with no ducts, top-floor rooms in Playa Vista, and smoke-day air in the Palisades corridor.
Beverly Hills, West Hollywood, Bel Air, Holmby Hills, Cheviot Hills.
Common here: nurseries retrofitted into former offices or guest rooms, far from the main system, on large lots with long line-set runs.
The Little Lungs Free Air Check costs nothing and carries no obligation. Laboratory-based indoor air quality tests are priced per sample by the lab and are a different service: they identify specific contaminants such as mold, asbestos or radon, which the Free Air Check does not sample for.
It is worth it when the check tells you something you can act on. The Free Air Check reports the actual temperature and humidity where your child sleeps, whether the room has any filtration beyond the mini split's coil screen, and whether the room is served by its own zone. Those three facts decide most of what a child's room needs.
You have three options: a consumer air monitor for continuous readings, a lab sampling kit or inspector for specific contaminants, or an in-home assessment by an HVAC professional who looks at temperature, humidity, airflow and filtration together. Little Lungs offers the third option free in the South Bay, Westside and Beverly Hills.
No. The Free Air Check is a comfort-and-air-handling assessment, not a laboratory test. If we see or smell something that needs a lab, we will tell you on the spot and point you to a licensed environmental testing company. We do not sell or subcontract that work.
The room is noticeably warmer or cooler than the thermostat reads, it feels stuffy by morning, there is condensation on the inside of windows, dust settles quickly on the crib rail, or a humidifier is leaving a fine white film on surfaces. None of these is a diagnosis; each is a reason to measure.
You get one of three answers: the room is fine as it is; a small change fixes it; or the room needs a designed solution. If it is the third, we give you a written scope and a price before anything else happens. Little Lungs pricing follows the Air Check and is never quoted from a phone call.
The South Bay (Manhattan Beach, Hermosa Beach, Redondo Beach, Torrance, the Palos Verdes Peninsula and El Segundo), the Westside (Santa Monica, Venice, Mar Vista, Culver City, Brentwood, Pacific Palisades, Marina del Rey and Playa Vista) and Beverly Hills with West Hollywood, Bel Air, Holmby Hills and Cheviot Hills.
A phone app reports outdoor AQI from the nearest public sensor, not the air in your child's room. A consumer monitor is useful for continuous readings but cannot tell you why the numbers are what they are, or what to change. The Free Air Check answers the why and the what.
Tell us which room and why. We'll come and measure it — no charge, no obligation, and a straight answer about what it needs.
Get Your Free Air Check