In ZIP 20106 the AC you’re calling about depends on the heat. About four owner homes in ten burn propane, so the outdoor unit is usually a plain air conditioner beside a furnace. A bit over a third heat with electricity, and there the outdoor unit is probably a heat pump that carries the house in January too. Tell us which you have: the parts that wear in July are the same, but the fault list isn’t.
Heat is what breaks them. The Boston station averages about 22 days a year at 90 degrees or higher, hit 100 on July 8 and 9, 2012, and the Rappahannock zone’s heat index ran over 110 in July 2011. A capacitor or contactor that was marginal in June gives up on a day like that, and the compressor trips soon after. From the book, a contactor replaced is $290 to $425.
Storms are the other cause. Quarter-size hail fell northwest of Amissville on June 19, 2023, and trees and limbs came down in the village in 2016, 2020 and 2025. Hail dents the thin aluminum fins on a condenser, and a limb can crush the fan guard or push the unit crooked, which strains the copper lines. Switch it off before anyone inspects it.
The median owner home in the ZIP was built in 1993, and about three in ten went up since 2000. Many first air conditioners are retired by now, so a big repair on an original system deserves the replacement number beside it, and we’ll give you both. A cheap repair on a young system is the easy decision; a pricey one on an old system is where the second number earns its keep.