said by scooper:When the wife and me bought this house (a 2400 sq ft singlestory contemporary),...
We have a single unit heatpump / propane furnace - a 4 ton heat pump and a similarly sized furnace in the crawlspace.
Unless you are in AZ near the Mexican border, that heat pump is WAY too big. Even there, it is too big. AC makes us feel comfortable by controlling humidity -- plus heat. You will be MUCH more comfortable at 85 degrees and 40 percent humidity than 70 degrees and 80 percent humidity.
Next time you replace the system (and that happens about every 16 years or so unless it is ground source) have a mechanical engineer look at the numbers.
It wouldn't surprise me that some previous owner got some idiot HVAC contractor to install a hugely oversized unit.
Going smaller will save you in power bills too.