Formerly Adam & Sam Brothers RepairNorth Seattle · Northgate to Ballard
Repairs for north Seattle, from Lake City to Ballard
Off-peak, Northgate is thirteen to seventeen minutes from our shop, Lake City sixteen to twenty, Greenwood seventeen to twenty-one and Ballard twenty-four to thirty. This page covers that north end of Seattle, where post-war houses and new apartments sit side by side.
- $85 diagnostic, included in the repair
- Same-day visits Mon–Sat
- 5.0 on Google
- $85 diagnosticBecomes part of the repair price when you say yes. If you pass on the repair, that visit is all you pay.
- Up to $18 offAny repair requested through the online form. The diagnostic itself is never reduced.
- $10 offA second appliance’s diagnostic when we check it during the same trip.
Most of north Seattle became Seattle in 1954, when the city limits moved from 85th Street to 145th and took in Greenwood north of 85th and Lake City, which had incorporated as a township only in 1949. The houses from that era, many of them 1940s to 1960s post-war homes, still make up much of the 98125 and 98133 ZIP codes. Northgate Mall opened in 1950 and is often called the first covered mall in the country; the Northgate Link station followed in October 2021, and the new station at NE 130th in Pinehurst adds a stop between Northgate and Shoreline. North Seattle College, Nathan Hale High School, Thornton Creek and the Kraken's headquarters and practice facility round out the area.
Ballard is older still: it was a separate city from 1889 to 1907, and its apartment wave began around 2007. Citywide, only 37 percent of Seattle homes are detached houses and 39 percent are in buildings of 20 or more units, and apartments now line the north end's arterials. Utilities differ from our Snohomish County cities: Seattle City Light supplies power, PSE supplies gas, and Seattle Public Utilities delivers the water. We drive down I-5 or SR 99 and carry common parts for furnaces, heat pumps and appliances, so most north-end repairs need only one visit.
13–30 min from our shop
North Seattle neighborhoods and their homes
Northgate and Maple Leaf
Post-war houses on the hills, new apartment buildings around the Link station and the old mall site. The houses bring gas furnaces, aging ducts and baseboard-heated rooms waiting for a heat pump; the apartments bring stacked laundry, compact dishwashers and ductless heat. Thornton Creek runs through Northgate as well as Lake City, and lower lots near it share the same damp basements.
Lake City and Pinehurst
The old township along Lake City Way and NE 125th St grew up after the war, and its side streets near Thornton Creek still hold ramblers with original ductwork and electric baseboards in later additions. Basements and crawlspaces near the creek stay damp, which is hard on furnaces and laundry.
Greenwood, Broadview, Bitter Lake and Haller Lake
Mostly 1940s–60s houses with some newer infill. Parts of Greenwood sit on an old peat bog, and settling floors can leave washers walking and dishwasher doors out of square; Seattle has treated its peat areas as environmentally critical since 2008.
Ballard
Older houses with basements and narrow stairs, plus the apartments built since about 2007 along 15th Ave NW and Market St. Laundry in older Ballard homes usually lives in the basement; in the new buildings it is a stacked pair in a closet with a long vent. The Locks, Golden Gardens and Shilshole Bay Marina mark the western edge, and homes near the water put outdoor units in salt air.
Electric heat, City Light and the heat dome
Seattle leans electric: about six in ten homes heat with electricity, whether baseboards, electric furnaces or heat pumps, and roughly a third burn PSE gas. That mix makes heat pumps the install question we hear most on the north end, and the 2021 Washington State Energy Code, in force since March 2024, pushes new construction the same way. We check which Seattle City Light or city programs apply to your address before you choose, without promising amounts. Ductless heat pumps suit many of these houses, especially those with radiators or undersized ducts, and a single-zone ductless system starts at $4,000 with equipment and installation included; coming out to measure and quote costs you nothing, and multi-zone systems are quoted on request. Cooling is the other driver: only 44.3 percent of Seattle-area homes had air conditioning in 2019, and Sea-Tac hit 108°F on June 28, 2021.
Heating & cooling in Seattle
Kitchens and basements on Tolt water
North of Green Lake, Seattle Public Utilities usually serves Tolt River water; a February 2026 sample measured 1.22 grains per gallon at the plant and 1.36 in the pipes, soft enough that scale rarely ends an appliance's life. The house does that instead. Basement laundry on uneven floors shakes washers apart, and in Greenwood's settling blocks a front-loader can walk across the room; washer repair in north Seattle starts at $245, and worn suspension rods and dampers are the usual job on machines like that. Take it as an opening price rather than a quote; the real number arrives on paper after the diagnostic. Older kitchens bring gas ranges with tired igniters and refrigerators boxed into tight alcoves, and new apartments bring compact appliances with sensitive electronics.
Appliance repair in Seattle
Common questions
Do you serve all of Seattle?
Our Seattle work centers on the north end: Northgate, Lake City, Greenwood, Ballard, and the neighborhoods around them such as Broadview, Bitter Lake, Haller Lake, Pinehurst, Maple Leaf and Wedgwood. Downtown is twenty-one to twenty-six minutes off-peak and much longer at rush hour, so for addresses farther south, call and we will tell you plainly what the schedule allows.
Our house runs on electric baseboards. What does a switch to a heat pump involve?
It starts with a site visit, at no cost, to look at the rooms, any old ductwork and the electrical panel. Houses with sound ducts from an earlier furnace usually take a ducted heat pump; baseboard-only houses usually take ductless heads, often two or three. You get a written quote with equipment and installation included, and we check which City Light or Seattle programs apply before you decide.
Our Greenwood floors have settled and the washer walks. Can you fix that?
Usually. A washer that walks has worn suspension rods, shocks or springs, an out-of-level stance, or both, and an uneven floor makes it worse. We level the machine, replace worn suspension parts if needed and check the drum bearings; if those have failed, we tell you, since we don't take on bearing replacements. If the floor itself is moving, we will say so, because no washer part fixes that.
Do you work in north Seattle apartments and condos?
Yes. We repair stacked washer-dryers, compact dishwashers, refrigerators, ranges and ductless systems in apartment and condo buildings across the north end, from Northgate to Ballard. Mention the floor, any loading zone or garage access, and whether a building manager needs notice, and read us the model number from the tag if you can.
Talk to Adam & Sam
Call (425) 570-9520 from anywhere between Broadview and Wedgwood, or book online and take up to $18 off the repair. Once you approve the repair, the $85 diagnostic stops being a separate charge; it is included.
Schedule a repair
Request a visit from Adam & Sam
Send the basics and we call you back with an arrival window, most days the same morning.
- $85 diagnostic Becomes part of the repair price when you say yes. If you pass on the repair, that visit is all you pay.
- Up to $18 off Any repair requested through the online form. The diagnostic itself is never reduced.
- $10 off A second appliance’s diagnostic when we check it during the same trip.