Pick one and we will keep it short. Three taps and you are done.
We run calls seven days a week, and we answer the phone around the clock.
Last step. We will call you back to confirm the window.
An emergency deserves a person, not a web form sitting in an inbox. Call the shop and we pick up.
No heat, no water, an active leak, or a backed up main. These move to the front of the line, day or night, weekend or holiday.
Your request is in and somebody will call you back to confirm a window. Here is what we have:
A heat pump heats and cools with one machine, and around here it should carry the winter almost entirely on its own, leaning on backup heat only for the coldest stretches. When the backup runs all season instead, the electric bill tells you before the house does.
One machine, two jobs. In summer a heat pump pulls heat out of your house and dumps it outside, which is what any air conditioner does. In winter it runs the cycle the other way and pulls heat out of the outdoor air, including air that feels cold to you. Nothing burns. That is why the outdoor unit runs in January.
Below some outdoor temperature your house loses heat faster than the heat pump can bring it in, and the backup covers the difference. Where that crossover sits depends on the house: insulation, windows, how leaky it is, how the ducts run. It is not a property of the brand on the box, so anyone quoting you a temperature over the phone is guessing. In most houses here the backup is an electric resistance heater in the air handler, which is a very large toaster and bills like one. In a dual fuel setup a gas furnace plays that part instead.
Which makes sizing the whole job. Section M1401.3 of the Virginia Residential Code requires equipment to be sized in accordance with ACCA Manual S, on building loads calculated in accordance with ACCA Manual J, and both documents are incorporated by reference into the Virginia building code. A load calculation is a legal requirement, not a courtesy. It measures your house. It is not the tonnage stamped on whatever somebody pulled out in 1998.
Heat pumps get written off for older homes, usually for the wrong reason. A heat pump delivers heat at a lower supply temperature than a furnace, so it has to move more air to put the same heat in the rooms, and the ducts decide whether that air arrives. Undersized returns, a trunk that was marginal when the house was built, long runs through a hot attic: any of those can cap a system that is well chosen on paper.
ENERGY STAR's Heating and Cooling Guide puts typical duct losses at about 20 percent of the air moving through the system, lost to leaks, holes, and poorly connected ducts. The same guide warns that a new high efficiency outdoor unit tied to an older furnace and blower will not perform to its rated efficiency. What we will not tell you is that your ducts are worn out. InterNACHI's chart puts ducting at 60 to 100 years. Old duct is usually leaky or undersized rather than used up, and sealing it and opening up return capacity beats tearing it out. More on our ductwork page.
| Equipment | DOE Energy Saver | InterNACHI chart |
|---|---|---|
| Heat pump | 15 years | 10 to 15 years |
| Central air conditioner | 15 to 20 years | 7 to 15 years |
| Outdoor condenser | not listed separately | 8 to 20 years |
| Gas furnace | 15 to 30 years | 15 to 25 years |
| Ductwork | not listed | 60 to 100 years |
EPA's Technology Transitions rule, published 24 October 2023 at 88 FR 73098, set a global warming potential limit of 700 on new residential and light commercial air conditioning and heat pump systems. It never names a refrigerant, it sets a number. EPA gives R-410A a GWP of 2,088, R-32 675 and R-454B 465, so the old refrigerant is over the line and the new ones are under it.
Here is what most HVAC sites still have wrong. Nearly everyone is publishing a 1 January 2026 cutoff for installing R-410A equipment. That deadline was removed. EPA's reconsideration rule, published 26 May 2026 at 91 FR 31284 and effective 27 July 2026, allows such a system to be installed where all specified components were manufactured or imported before 1 January 2025. Two limits survive: equipment built in Mexico or Canada before that date but imported on or after it may not be installed, and components made or imported on or after it cannot be assembled into a new R-410A system. It is leftover inventory, so it is finite.
If you own an R-410A heat pump, none of this obliges you to replace it. EPA's wording: “Yes, you can continue to repair your existing refrigeration, air conditioning, and heat pump system. This includes replacing a major component like a condensing unit or compressor.” In the May 2026 rule EPA added that it expects the move away from R-410A to continue without the Agency needing to restrict repairs. The refrigerant itself is not banned. Production steps down to 30 percent of baseline for 2029 through 2033, so expect scarcer and dearer rather than illegal. EPA's own answers are at epa.gov, worth reading instead of taking any contractor's word, ours included.
New equipment runs R-454B or R-32. Both are A2L under ANSI/ASHRAE Standard 34-2024, where A means lower toxicity and 2L means lower flammability. It is not propane, which sits in the higher class. Equipment is listed to UL 60335-2-40, and Virginia has already amended the code for it at IRC Sections M1411.1.1 through M1411.1.6. Two matter to you. M1411.1.4 requires a permanent label carrying the contact information of the company that installed the system along with the refrigerant charge and number, so whoever charges your equipment signs it. And M1411.1.3 bars field installed duct accessories on an A2L system from containing electric heating elements or open flames, or switching loads above 2.5 kVA. On a heat pump the backup heat is electric, so it has to be settled when the equipment is chosen rather than strapped into a duct two winters later.
One more piece of scare copy to put down. The federal leak repair requirements that began 1 January 2026 apply to appliances holding 15 pounds or more, and the residential heat pump subsector is specifically exempt. No federal rule will make you fix a leak at home. Fix it anyway: ENERGY STAR notes an incorrect charge can cut efficiency by 5 to 20 percent and damage the compressor. Copeland, which builds a lot of these compressors, teaches root cause. A compressor that looks electrically dead usually died of a charge or mechanical fault first, so swapping it without finding the cause buys the same failure twice.
The 25C credit that paid for heat pumps is gone. Public Law 119-21 terminated it for property placed in service after 31 December 2025, and 25D, which covered geothermal, ended on the same date, measured by when installation was completed. The federal Home Energy Rebates were not cancelled, but they run state by state and DOE sends homeowners to their state energy office. We could not verify where Virginia's programme stands, so we will not quote you a figure. Check energy.gov yourself, and if a contractor promises a specific state rebate, ask where it is published.
USBC Section 108.1 requires a permit before work on mechanical systems or any equipment the building code regulates, which is how a changeout normally reads. But the ordinary repair list at Section 108.2 includes item 14.4, replacement of mechanical appliances provided the equipment is not fueled by gas or oil, and that language lands squarely on an all electric heat pump swap. Localities do not all read it the same way, so we check Prince William's current answer for your job rather than assume. Two things hold either way. On exempt work an owner can ask for a permit and the locality must issue it and inspect, which is useful paperwork if you are selling. And county inspections have to be requested by 3 p.m. the working day before.
We repair every brand, and most heat pump calls end in a repair rather than a sale. Reversing valves, defrost boards, contactors and charge faults are routine. We raise replacement for a failed compressor in an old system, or where the real problem is capacity no part will fix. You get the reasoning either way. Call (703) 491-6542 and a person picks up. See also air conditioning, furnaces and seasonal maintenance, which matters more on a heat pump because the same machine works twelve months a year.
One call covers plumbing and HVAC. Talk to somebody who has been doing this for decades.
