I wasn't sure if I should post in this forum or the "Appliance Forum"  - so please forgive in advance.  Advise and I'll start another thread on that forum.

I'm looking for recommendations for a heat pump NON Geo Thermal unit.  Please don't try to talk me into a geo thermal.  It's too late in the game to change the spec to that and I don't have the room on the property to run the underground loops.

A friend of mine that runs an HVAC company, sells Trane and will sell me one (and the air handler) at cost, so that is hard to beat.  But before I commit, I want to see if there are other brands to consider.

Considering the following qualities (in no particular order):

1. Cost vs. performance.  I don't want to spend 5x the money for the unit to save marginally on efficiency and it take 10 years to pay for the price increase.
2. But I do need hi efficiency - whatever that means these days considering all the sales hyperbole (variable stage probably a must, multi speed fan/air handler too). I'm close to exceeding my Title 24 audit so efficiency can help contribute to compliance.
3. All electric, no gas.
4. No AC required, won't need to use it but maybe 1 week a year and opening windows  is an alternative
5. Northern Cal coastal zone (Trinidad/Eureka area), mild winters, load calcs on the house indicated 30k btu (3 ton unit is needed)
6. Serviceability down the road...parts available
7. Reliability (this is important).

Many views, but no comments. Should I post this on one of the other forums on this site?

Some times the pros around here get a little busy with their day jobs. Generally when asked about appliance selection, we would start with the question "what is your manual J load, price of electricity etc. then we can explore cost v benefit of different technologies.
By far the best place to start with an all electric house is buillding envelope. Make it as tight as you can. With ASHPs the splits are superior in performance to the ducted units.
1 ducted unit is about as good as the next IMHO if they are of similar components (don't compare one unit with a 2 stage compressor to another with a variable speed compressor).
In my AO the airsource heat pumps pay for themselves about as quickly as ground source heat pumps (<5 years).
Goodman products are available on line and have 10 year part warranties right out of the box. Quality control issues plagued them in the 90's but things have improved over the last several years. Now owned by Daiken I expect VRF in all of their products shortly.

I don't have any first hand knowledge of the unit, but I have seen mentioned here on this site the new Carrier Infinity with Greenspeed is a pretty impressive unit. I don't know anything regarding the cost of the unit. It might be worth looking into.

I had a GE ASHP in this house for 26 yrs and 'never' had a problem until the compressor decided to quit in the middle of winter. Had everything replaced (except ductwork)  with Traine 6 yrs ago. They have been out SEVEN times since and it was something different 'every' P))(&*^(*%&*%&^*%*& time!!!

While I don't happen to carry Trane, it is absolutely fair to say that there will be no service record between a 26 year old anything and a modern unit. There will also be no comparison in efficiency or the temperatures that the equipment operates in.
Both durability and efficiency come at a cost. In the HVAC industry however durability is not available as it once was, government minimum efficiencies have seen to that.

Joe, we lived in the house for those first 26 yrs. NO service records! Does GE even make heatpumps still? Yes, it reduced our elect bill right off the bat at least 30%. IMO, the old unit was made fairly simple. Now, the units have soooooo much extra involved to get much more eff, there is ALLOT more to go wrong. What's your opinion on this?

Oops, I meant to say "While I don't happen to carry Trane, it is absolutely fair to say that there will be no service record COMPARISON between a 26 year old anything and a modern unit."

"Does GE even make heatpumps still?"

I believe they still sell HVAC under that lable, they are the same as American Standard. Ironically they are owned by Trane.

"Yes, it reduced our elect bill right off the bat at least 30%. IMO, the old unit was made fairly simple. Now, the units have soooooo much extra involved to get much more eff, there is ALLOT more to go wrong. What's your opinion on this?"

My opinion is government regulation often does not make things better or cheaper. A 30% savings of electricity is darned good however. As I alluded before, that is the trade.
Is it a good one?

I remember being a high school buck just after the oil embargo of the late 70's and drooling at all the new racey 4 cylinder turbos which I equated to great fuel savings. My ever practical father pointed out to me that economy wasn't just about MPG. He was correct. Though I spent much more time at the gas pump with my good old 6 and 8 cylinders, my friends with the "money saving" 4 cylinders spent much, much more on repairs.

The Carrier Greenspeed is a fairly high-efficiency unit if you can find a competent contractor who won't screw it up for you with poorly implemented ducts. (Title 24 requires Manual-D duct designs and duct-leakage testing, so you're probably better off in that regard than most.) For places with 99% outside design temps of about +15F or higher (basically US Climate zone 4 or lower, which means everywhere in CA that isn't high-altitude) they can come in at near-mini-split type efficiencies. IIRC the biggest unit is a 3-ton, that can deliver over 30,000BTU/hr @ +15F with some of the Greenspeed air handlers. The 2-tonner is good for about 20-25,000BTU/hr @ +15F.

Click on the "Heating Capacities" tab on this tool, and play around with the air handler & compressor options at the bottom of the left column:

http://www.tools.carrier.com/greenspeed/

Joe, you didn't answer the question about these newer units are MUCH more complicated that they were 20 yrs ago and MORE things can go wrong.

I've alluded to that conclusion repeatedly Robin. While not grossly more complicated, there are more components to fail and they do.

Thanks Joe. It just amazes me while that GE HP lasted 30 yrs without ONE problem. We bought the house when it was 4 yrs old. But I have a Traine installed and have had 7 service calls in 6 yrs and EVERY time it was something different! There is something grossly wrong with that!!!