Water Heater Repair & Replacement
Cold showers, rusty water, or a tank that rumbles
In a house built in 1963, the water heater is not original — but it is often the third or fourth one, sitting in the same basement corner with the same undersized drain pan and the same venting nobody has looked at in twenty years. We look at all of it.
- Tank and tankless
- Most repairs done same visit
- Straight answer on repair vs. replace
- Venting and pan checked, not assumed
The honest question
Repair it, or replace it?
Plenty of shops replace by default because the ticket is bigger. Here is the actual line we use.
Usually worth repairing
Under about eight years old with a failed thermostat, element, thermocouple or T&P valve. Those are parts, not a new appliance.
Usually worth replacing
Ten-plus years, rusty hot water, or a leak at the tank seam. A leaking tank cannot be repaired — that is the tank itself failing.
The gray zone
Eight to ten years with a repairable fault. We give you the repair cost and the replacement cost and let you decide.
Want numbers before we come out? See our water heater replacement cost guide for Florissant-area ranges.
Why it matters
What we check that others skip
The drain pan and where it drains
In a finished basement, a heater with no pan or a pan draining nowhere is a flood waiting for a schedule. We flag it.
The venting
Sixty-year-old houses have had two or three heaters swapped in. Venting that was fine for the first one is not always fine now.
The shutoff above it
The cold inlet valve should turn. On a lot of these it has not moved in a decade, and that matters the day the tank goes.
And the expansion tank
Required on many closed systems. If yours should have one and does not, you will hear about it before we quote.
Tankless
Worth it in a 1960s house?
Sometimes. In this housing stock the answer depends more on the gas line and venting than on the unit.
Tankless gives you endless hot water, frees up basement floor space, and can outlast a tank. The catch in Florissant homes is what it takes to get there: a tankless unit demands more gas than a tank, and a sixty-year-old gas line is frequently undersized for it. Add new venting and often a condensate drain, and the install cost is meaningfully more than the unit price suggests. It is still a good buy if you plan to stay ten or more years. We will tell you what your specific house needs before you commit to the idea.
How we work
What to expect when you call
- 01
We diagnose before quoting
Age, fault, tank condition, venting and pan. Ten minutes of diagnosis saves you from replacing a heater that needed a part.
- 02
You get both numbers
Where repair is viable, you get the repair price and the replacement price side by side, with our recommendation and why.
- 03
Installed and hauled away
New unit set, connected, tested, and the old one taken with us. Pan and expansion tank where code calls for it.
Free estimate
Get a water heater quote
Tell us the age and what it is doing. We will give you a range on the phone and a firm number on site.
Related: replacement cost, emergency plumber, leak detection, galvanized pipe replacement, signs you need a plumber
Got a plumbing problem that is not getting better on its own?
Call for anything urgent, or send the form and we will get back to you within one business day with a real number.