AC Installation in Cincinnati, OH
A new air conditioner in Cincinnati will run from June through September every year. Tell us about the house, and a licensed contractor who covers Hamilton County will get in touch.
Tell us about the job
It takes about a minute.
Four months of real heat in Hamilton County
Summer afternoons here average 85°F, June through September. That is four months where a new air conditioner needs to hold up and keep running, not just turn on.
Hail and wind show up in this area too, 79 hail events and 169 damaging wind events recorded over the last ten years. The outdoor unit sits outside through all of that. Any new central air conditioner installed here has to meet a federal minimum of 13.4 SEER2, so that baseline is already built into what a contractor can install.
- 4 months
- June through September, your air conditioner is on duty
- 85°F
- the average summer afternoon it cools against
- 79 hail events
- in ten years, and hail bends the fins on outdoor coils
- 13.4 SEER2
- the federal minimum any new unit must meet
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
A higher-efficiency unit would save about $30 a year to run in Hamilton County compared with a new unit at the federal minimum.
Estimates for a typical Hamilton County home, from EIA household energy data, Ohio fuel prices and NOAA climate normals. Your home will differ.
In Ohio, HVAC licensing for homes is left to the counties.
Hamilton County sets its own rule on who can install an air conditioner in a home, since Ohio leaves that to the counties instead of running a state license. Whatever a county asks for, it applies because of the address, not because Ohio tested the contractor. Ohio's definition of a home contractor also calls for at least $250,000 in liability insurance. That is a definition of the business, not a credential earned by passing anything.
In most cities and counties, an air conditioner installation needs a permit from the local building office along with an inspection once the work is done. That inspection is what checks the work here, not a license.
Source: Ohio Legislative Service Commission
- What size air conditioner does my house need?
- There is no single number that works for every house, and picking one off a chart is how you end up with a unit that short cycles or never quite keeps up on a 85°F afternoon. The right size comes from a load calculation, which looks at your square footage, your insulation, how many windows you have and which way they face, and how many people are usually home. A contractor can run this for your house and size the outdoor unit and coil to match.
- Should I replace the whole system or just the outdoor unit?
- In most cases, if your indoor coil and outdoor unit were installed together, replace them together. The two are matched to work as a pair, and putting a new outdoor unit on an old coil can mean it never reaches the efficiency or the cooling it's rated for. A contractor can check the age and condition of your indoor coil, ductwork, and refrigerant lines to tell you whether they're worth keeping.
- Do HVAC contractors in Cincinnati need a state license to work on my home?
- Ohio leaves HVAC licensing for homes to the counties, so there's no single statewide answer. Whether a contractor working on your Cincinnati home needs a license depends on what Hamilton County requires. Ask any contractor you're considering directly about their license and check with the county if you want to confirm it yourself.