$300,000 In Gold Dust Found In Sacramento Home During HVAC Installation

SACRAMENTO (CBS13) - Sacramento homeowners called for what was going to be an expensive new heating and air system but ending up striking gold.

Workers installing the equipment found a secret gold stash hidden away in the house.

They pride on customer service at Clark & Rush, but this is one guarantee they say they can't make, finding gold on every house call. The total value of what they found was $300,000 worth of gold. The total cost of the HVAC installation was around $6,500.

After hundreds and hundreds of HVAC installations, Steve Ottley said the jackpot discovery was one of a kind.

"I still can't believe it today," he said. "It's unreal. We kind of just looked at each other and said 'wow'."

Back in September, beneath the floor grill of an older home, Steve and his partner discovered 12 baby food jars filled to the brim with gold dust.

"I looked at it and said, 'I think that's gold,'" he said.

Clark & Rush has been in Sacramento for 50 years and they're celebrating their golden anniversary. But don't expect a guarantee of "gold after every installation."

"That's one promise we can't make, but I can say this, the integrity and professionalism of Clark & Rush, every time we find this type of thing, we are always trustworthy and upfront," Mark Thyne said.

Where the gold came from is still a mystery. The lucky homeowners didn't want to be part of the story, but we're told they're handling their new gold just fine.

And in a moment of honesty, Steve told us for a split-second he considered sneaking off with the golden discovery.

"I've had similar incidents happened to me where jewelry and gold was taken from me," he said.

Believe it or not, this isn't the first time this has happened at Clark and Rush. Back in the 1980s workers discovered $25,000 worth of gold coins.