Elephant Energy, based in Westborough, sells and plans heat-pump conversions — mini-splits, ducted systems, heat-pump water heaters — but doesn't send its own crews to install them. Nearly every project described in the record, on Google and on Reddit alike, was actually installed by a subcontractor, most often a company called Forge; one Reddit poster described the split plainly: "Elephant does more planning and Forge does the actual install". Google shows the company at 4.5 stars from 41 ratings.
When the process goes as designed, reviewers are specific and enthusiastic. One customer compared several larger HVAC players and picked Elephant because its team actually ran capacity calculations for the space instead of eyeballing it, then got the install onto an expedited schedule, in a 2024 review. Another had a gas water heater fail with two weeks still to go before a scheduled heat-pump water heater install; the project manager, Santiago Enrique, got a plumber and electrician out the next day to replace it on an emergency basis, in a late-2024 and early-2025 review. A named project manager, Joe, is credited with walking a recent customer through a heat-pump install that "went without a hitch".
The record also shows a repeated weak point: what happens when something goes wrong after the sale or after the install. In a March 2025 review, a customer described being approved for financing, then told a month later — after the walkthrough — that the financed system couldn't actually be installed, and having to restart the whole design process. A separate March 2025 review described Elephant flagging an inadequate air return, having the customer pay to fix it, then rejecting the job over that very modification after two months of delay. And this summer, two 1-star reviews — one on Google, one on Angi — described a mini-split that started shutting itself off on warm days, with more than a month of unanswered calls, texts, and missed service appointments. A similar pattern shows up in a 2025 review: a system stopped cooling, calls went unreturned, and a follow-up visit misdiagnosed the fix. Not every service call goes this way — other reviewers describe fast, attentive fixes from named service staff and free repairs that resolved cleanly — but the gap between those two experiences is wide enough to be worth asking about directly.
For a straightforward heat-pump quote and install, the sales and design process gets consistently good marks. Before signing, it's worth asking who specifically performs the installation, confirming financing terms are locked before any walkthrough, and asking what the service-response process looks like if something needs a fix after the crew leaves.
