You bought your home and now you have realized all the things your landlord would take care of
. He paid for snow plowing, he mowed the lawn and when the shower leaked he paid for that. You now have all of those responsibilities and knew or didn't know that you have to clean your furnace or heating and air yearly. You will want to vacuum dust and debris out of any registers in your home and hire a professional to perform an inspection and cleaning of your furnace.
Some families may choose to try to clean their own furnace. If you go this route you may want to watch a professional perform a cleaning at least one time. The cleaning process is not that hard, but another aspect of hiring a professional s that they know what it should look like. They inspect the system for any damage and they know how to repair it. This will be a part of the cleaning process. You will want to change the filter at this time as well. If you cleaned and changed the filters yourself eventually you might at least know what the unit should look like, but you may not be able to prepare yourself for everything that might go wrong.
An inspection of your unit is something you should do. You should have a general idea of whether your unit is collecting water or if there is a smell. You will want to know if it is taking in air and if the blower is blowing out. You will want to be sure you know if it's draining properly. This information can tell a technician a lot about what might be wrong with your heating and air. Once you familiarize yourself with your unit you may be able to take care of small issues yourself. Something like draining for instance might simply be because someone set a box on the drain hose keeping water from draining past the box. Another problem could be the hose got shifted and is no longer pointing downhill. Simple things like this will become apparent to you and your system will seem less intimidating.
Consider keeping up on maintenance of your heating and air. It will work harder and more efficiently for you. While you may look back fondly at the lack of chores from your renting days, you will love owning your own home once you get the hang of this maintenance stuff. You should have a list of repairmen ready for the harder jobs.