Northeastern Fireplace & Design

We had been getting chimneys cleaned and other service from them for a long time, and they always were responsive and reliable. Most recently, a guy came with a drone and spent most of his time taking drone pictures of our chimney, and then gave us a real scare story about all the work we needed, at tens of thousands of dollars. We then went up onto the roof and took a close look. The flashing and caulking he said needed redoing was in perfect shape. The cement caps on the chimneys were solid and not crumbling as he claimed. The pointing was still solid after the most recent re-pointing. If he thought things were so bad from the drone pictures, he should have gone up on the roof himself to double check. The real problem though is that now we can't take his word for anything about the whole fireplace system, so we will need to go elsewhere in the future.

I spent years researching inserts and grills, and spent time with Matchless Stove & Chimney, Best Fire Hearth & Patio, and Northeastern Fireplace & Design. Here's what I found.

The sales guy at Best Fire tried to rip me off to the tune of $1,500, so a decision was quickly made to never go there again, and it was narrowed down to Northeastern vs Matchless. I would compare it as Mercedes vs Subaru. If you have an extra couple thousand to burn, go with Matchless, you will not be disappointed. If you are cost conscious, go with Northeastern, you will not be disappointed. I ended up buying my grill from Matchless and both of my inserts from Northeastern.

Super friendly, not pushy about extra repair services offered, they arrived on time, and worked efficiently

We recently purchased a wood stove insert from Northeastern Fireplace and had them install it in our living room. This was replacing a 2-year old gas stove purchased and installed from another company. In addition to installing our new Morso 5660 wood stove insert with an electric blower attachment, Billy and Frank from Northeastern moved the gas stove to our basement and installed it there. We began with an onsite assessment in late January 2015 and we received a written estimate for all the work via email the very next day. We had a second onsite visit and estimate, which took 3 weeks while Northeastern took only a few days. Northeastern's estimate was far more reasonable and they needed only 3-5 days to order the new insert, receive it and set up an install date once they received our 50% deposit. Billy and Frank were a pleasure to have around the house. On day 1, they had the new wood stove installed and a fire roaring in the fireplace. They were 90% finished with the re-installation of the Valor Gas Stove in the basement and came back as planned 2 days later to complete that process. The first day they were here from 9 am to 4 pm and on the second visit they were here less than 3 hours. They patched the wall in the living room where the wooden mantel had been and fired up the gas stove in the basement on that second day. Billy explained that our gas fireplace installation 2 years prior (different company) had been botched and that was why the Valor was unreliable - often the fire going out after a few hours due to the fact that the chimney insulation was incorrectly positioned and choked off the air from the intake liner. In addition, Frank will be back to repair our chimney which the prior company had not mentioned needed major work. We would trust Northeastern with our lives - they kept to their estimate and work schedules, were honest about all work performed and kept us informed as they did their work. Billy and Frank were fun and loved our dog, did great work and perfect finishing work as well and in general Northeastern are just a great bunch to work with. We highly recommend Joe Shearer (owner), Brenda (office manager) and Billy and Frank who make a great team and charge fair prices for their excellent work. We've had two other Hudson Valley fireplace and masonry companies here and we will continue to give our business to the best: Northeastern Fireplace.

I was shopping for a Mendota gas insert and installation, and also need some repairs to my chimney. They came to the house and provided a written quote for everything, and I decided to go with them. They would not honor the quote, the owner blamed a mistake on the person who came out to do the estimate. I paid the higher price and they came to do the installation but did not do the chimney repair that was agreed to. They did not return my calls to follow up on the repair. They did a minor repair inside which made my beautiful fireplace look ridiculous because the grout color is no where near the existing. All in all, a terrible experience and clearly the owner Joe could care less about customer satisfaction or customer service. I have never written a negative review about any product or service, but people need to know that they should look elsewhere when shopping for a stove or insert.