Established 1985 · 41 years
A Maryland heating and cooling company, still doing it the long way.
We have been installing and repairing systems in Montgomery County since 1985. Long enough to be replacing our own work, which is a useful discipline.
Who we are
Four decades in the same basements.
Poteete HVAC started in 1985 serving Montgomery County homeowners, and we have stayed deliberately local ever since. That means our crews know which Silver Spring streets have masonry chimneys serving two appliances, which Potomac roads have no gas main, which Takoma Park blocks fall inside the historic district, and which Germantown communities were built with mechanical closets that will not accept a modern condensing furnace without planning.
None of that is information you can look up. It is what you accumulate by replacing the replacement — by opening a basement in 2026 and recognising the oil-to-gas conversion your own company did in 1998, sitting on ductwork originally sized for gravity flow in 1949.
We are licensed, bonded and insured in Maryland, our technicians hold EPA Section 608 certification, and we are equipped for R-22, R-410A and the current A2L refrigerants. What we are not is a franchise with a call centre and a commission structure.
How we work
Four standards we do not trade away
We measure before we quote
A room-by-room Manual J load calculation and a static pressure reading on the existing ductwork, every time, before any equipment is specified. It takes about an hour. It is also the difference between a system that works and one you resent for fifteen years.
We write the numbers down
Superheat, subcooling, static pressure, temperature rise, combustion analysis. Every invoice carries the readings that led to the diagnosis, so the next person who opens your system starts from data instead of guesswork.
We pull the permit
Equipment replacement is permitted and inspected through the county. We file it, schedule it and meet the inspector. Unpermitted mechanical work voids warranties and shows up on the home inspection when you sell.
We tell you when not to buy
If your ducts need sealing more than your ducts need cleaning, we say so. If a repair makes more sense than a replacement, we say that too. Forty years in the same neighbourhoods only works if people call you back.
Straight answer
Why there are no star ratings on this site.
Plenty of contractor sites carry review markup that produces gold stars in search results. We have not added any, because review structured data has to reflect genuine, verifiable reviews — inventing it violates Google’s policies and, more to the point, it would be a lie printed on the first thing a stranger reads about us.
If you want to know what our customers think, ask us for references in your own neighbourhood. After forty years in Montgomery County, there are usually several within a few streets of you.
What this site does carry is the actual technical reasoning behind the work: how we size equipment, what we measure, what the Maryland code requires, and what genuinely differs between a Bethesda Tudor and an Olney colonial. That seemed more useful than adjectives.
Credentials
Licensing and certification
- EPA Section 608 Universal certified technicians
- NATE-certified installation crews
- Maryland HVACR licensed and insured
- Montgomery County DPS permit filing included
- MD HVACR Contractor License #01-XXXXX, issued by the Maryland Board of Heating, Ventilation, Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Contractors
- Refrigerant recovery and handling per EPA Section 608 — venting is a federal violation, not a shortcut
Verify any Maryland HVACR contractor’s licence before hiring them, including ours. It takes two minutes and it is the single best protection a homeowner has.
Talk to a technician
Tell us what the house is doing.
Describe the problem and we will tell you what it usually means, what it typically costs to diagnose, and when we can be there. No obligation, no scripted sales call.
Mon–Fri 7:00am–6:00pm · Saturday 8:00am–2:00pm · 24/7 emergency service