iPlug said:
Best are Rheem and the relabeled brands they make. We've had ours a few years and it is wonderful. Have been following these for years, and no reliability issues that I am aware of to date.
https://www.rheem.com/products/residential/water-heating/hybrid/
Home Depot carries them. Recommend you go one volume size higher than what you have currently if you want to run it in heat pump mode ~100% of the time.
Thanks, iPlug. I’m aware of and really like the Rheem models, and I was all set to have one installed this fall, but then I read some of the customer reviews on Home Depot’s webpage. There are a lot of angry customers giving 1 star reviews. The same goes for AO Smith heat pump water heaters at Lowe’s. The issue with both brands seems to be that things go wrong after 1-3 years with the anode rods, resistive heating elements, the heat pump itself, and/or the “smart” mode tech (which, when something goes wrong, can apparently shut the whole unit down). And even though some of these units are covered by 6-10 year warranties, this is for parts, not labor, so every time something breaks, you have to find and pay a local plumber to fix the problem (if you can even find someone who knows how to work on these). So don’t get me wrong - I think heat pump water heaters sound awesome in theory, and I’d really like to get one, but I don’t want to buy something that’s breaking all the time where suddenly my wife and 2 year old son have to take cold showers/baths for a week while Home Depot sends out replacement parts. To me, a reliable water heater is something that you can hook up and then never speak or think about again for 10 years. So I’ve been considering just getting a regular electric resistance water heater, despite the significant consumption penalty, if that means it will have Toyota Corolla level reliability for a decade.