"What does a mini-split run for my garage?" is a forty-second phone call that ends one of three ways. You give a number, it turns out to be wrong, and you spend the site visit walking it back. You say "it depends," and the caller hangs up and dials the next contractor. Or you spend six minutes collecting the physical facts an estimator actually needs, and you book a visit with a range the homeowner already believes.
Mini-split work carries one of the widest installed-price spreads in residential HVAC. Same brand, same tonnage, and the job swings hard on details nobody volunteers: a panel with no open slots, a fifty-foot line-set run around the back of the house, a ceiling cassette planned for a joist bay too shallow to take one. The intake call is where you find out which of those jobs you are quoting.
Zones and rooms, measured rather than described
Start with how many indoor heads the caller thinks they want, then get the dimensions behind each one. Length and width, ceiling height, and whether the ceiling is flat or vaulted. A 24 by 24 garage with a 12-foot ceiling is a different load than the same footprint at 8 feet.
Then ask what the space is made of. Is the garage insulated, and are the walls finished? Attached to the house or detached? How many windows, and which direction do they face? A west-facing sunroom with four large windows needs more capacity than a shaded bedroom of identical size, and a caller will describe both as "a small room."
Write down what the room does wrong today. "Hits 95 in August and the window unit can't keep up" or "never gets above 58 in winter" tells the estimator whether this is a cooling job, a heating job, or both. In cold-climate territory that answer decides whether you are pricing a standard system or a hyper-heat model, which is a different number entirely.
Ask about ductwork even though the system is ductless
Ductless does not mean the house has no ducts. Whether there are ducts, and what condition they are in, changes the conversation.
If a central system already serves the house and the caller wants a mini-split for one problem room, this is a supplemental install and probably a single zone. If the central system is dead and they are considering going ductless whole-house, you are looking at a multi-zone design, a possible teardown, and a conversation about what happens to the old equipment and the abandoned duct runs. If there is an oil or gas furnace staying in place as backup, note it, because that affects both the load calculation and the electrical work.
Ask the age and fuel type of whatever is in there now. Two questions, and they reframe the whole estimate.
The electrical questions that change the price most
This is where phone quotes go wrong. Most outdoor units run on a dedicated 208/230V circuit, and if the panel cannot carry another one, the job grows a subpanel or a service upgrade and the price moves in a way no BTU chart predicts.
Get these before the call ends:
- Main breaker rating. The big number at the top of the panel, usually 100, 150, or 200 amps.
- Open breaker spaces. Ask them to count empty slots, and to say whether any existing breakers look doubled up.
- Panel brand and rough age. Some older panels no longer accept new breakers safely, and finding that out at the panel on install day is an expensive surprise.
- Where the panel is, and roughly how far it sits from where the outdoor unit would go. Basement panel, condenser on the far side of the house, and you have a long home run through finished space.
- Whether an electrician is already involved, or whether the homeowner expects you to handle the circuit.
The easiest version of all of this: ask the caller to text a photo of the open panel door and the label inside it. Most people will do it while still on the phone, and one picture answers four questions.
Line-set run, lift, and where the condenser sits
The refrigerant line set connects each indoor head to the outdoor unit, and its length and vertical rise both have manufacturer limits. Systems ship with a precharge good for a set base length, and past that the installer adds refrigerant by the foot. Long runs also mean more line-hide cover, more penetrations, and more labor on a ladder.
So ask where the outdoor unit could go, then ask how far that is from each indoor head. Same wall, or all the way around the house? What floor is the head on, and how many feet above or below the condenser? Does the run pass through finished living space, which forces a chase or an exterior cover, or can it drop through an unfinished basement or attic?
Two more that people forget. Is there a clear spot for the outdoor unit on a pad, or does it need a wall bracket or a snow stand? And does the homeowner care what the line-hide looks like on the front of the house, because paintable line cover is cheap and an interior chase is not.
Hear it handled live. Answara's own AI receptionist answers our main line. Call (857) ANSWARA and ask it whatever a customer would ask you, or see plans and get set up.
Head type, mounting height, and condensate
The default is a high-wall head, and for most rooms it is the right answer. Ask what wall the homeowner has in mind and what is on that wall now, because a head blowing straight down onto a sofa or a bed is the most common complaint after a good install.
Ceiling cassettes come up when someone has seen one in an office. They need clear plenum depth above the ceiling, commonly ten to fourteen inches, so a shallow joist bay or a vaulted ceiling rules one out without a soffit build. Ask what is above the ceiling in that room. Floor consoles fit under windows and along knee walls where there is no clear wall real estate. Slim concealed ducted units need a chase or attic space and short duct runs.
Then the drain. Wall heads on an exterior wall usually gravity drain through the same penetration as the lines. Cassettes, interior-wall heads, and anything in a basement typically need a condensate pump, which is a part, a circuit, and a noise the homeowner should hear about before install day.
Permits, and how to talk about them
Most jurisdictions require a mechanical permit for a mini-split, and many require a separate electrical permit for the new circuit. Ask for the city or county and the property type, note whether the home is in a historic district or under an HOA with exterior equipment rules, and log it for the estimator.
Say what is true and stop there. "That will need a mechanical permit and probably an electrical one, and we pull those" is fine. Telling a homeowner the inspection will happen next Tuesday is not, because your office does not control the inspector's calendar. Give the process, skip the date.
Why the site visit is nearly always required
Even with every answer above, someone has to stand in the room. Load calculations depend on insulation and infiltration nobody can report over the phone. Wall cavities hide framing, plumbing, and old wiring exactly where the three-inch core needs to go. Panel labels lie. Setback rules and clearance to windows and property lines get checked with a tape measure.
Say that plainly on the call, and say why. "The reason we come out is that the price depends on your panel and the line run, and I would rather tell you the real number than a number I have to change." Most homeowners take that better than a fast guess.
Giving a range without quoting a price
You can be useful on the phone without committing. Name the variables in order of impact: number of zones, electrical capacity, line-set length, and head type. Then give a wide honest band for a job of that description in your market, and say clearly what would push it to each end. "A single-zone garage unit with a panel that has room is the low end. If the panel is full, add the electrical work."
The intake itself is the deliverable. Zones and dimensions, current heating and cooling, panel details, condenser location, run distance and lift, head type, drain path, and jurisdiction. A dispatcher who captures those eight things hands an estimator a real job instead of a name and a phone number. If your phones go unanswered after five, and mini-split shopping happens on weeknights, an AI receptionist can work the same checklist and leave the answers in the morning queue.