Will a heat pump pay off in Wichita Falls, TX?

In Wichita Falls, the math is close enough that it comes down to how long you plan to stay. Swap a failed furnace and AC for a heat pump rather than buying like-for-like, and the extra cost here runs $3,500 after a $2,000 federal tax credit. Wichita Falls's residents would see roughly $364 a year back in running costs, putting the payback around 9.6 years. It's a genuine toss-up here — Wichita Falls's numbers don't point clearly either way.

How cold Wichita Falls actually gets

2237 heating degree days pile up here every year, so Wichita Falls has a mild winter by US standards; the cooling side runs to 2981 cooling degree days, where summers are severe enough that cooling can dominate the annual bill. Sizing runs off the design temperature, not the average day: 13.6°F here (record low 6.8°F), which works out to a seasonal COP of 3.03 for the cold-climate class of unit this climate calls for. A cold-climate unit is the right call in Wichita Falls — below 25°F design temperature, a standard heat pump leans hard on electric-resistance backup, which erases most of the savings. Climate figures trace to the nearest NOAA station, KICKAPOO DOWNTOWN AIRPORT, 4.6 miles from Wichita Falls.

The month-to-month numbers for Wichita Falls

A 2000-square-foot house here would pull roughly 1,869 heating kilowatt-hours annually on top of cooling, totalling about $712 a year on electricity. That compares with roughly 23 Mcf a year of gas at Wichita Falls's 19.42 per-Mcf rate — about $1,076 a year — against a local electricity rate of 16.15¢/kWh. Looked at as a full purchase rather than an incremental one, payback here is roughly 37.1 years, leaving the 15-year total $1,960 ahead.

If your home heats with electric baseboard instead of gas

Plenty of homes in Wichita Falls heat with electricity alone, no gas line involved. Compared with baseboard or electric-furnace resistance heat, the numbers shift in the heat pump’s favor. About $826 a year comes back this way, enough that the 9.7-year payback clears the $8,000 premium comfortably within the equipment's life.

Wichita Falls against the rest of the country

Among 3206 cities, Wichita Falls's winter puts it at rank 2313 for severity, while its size puts it at rank 329 for population — 1 in both cases being the extreme. That's the mildest third of cities covered, where utility rates carry more of the answer than climate does.

Next step for 102,372 people in Wichita Falls

Wichita Falls, Texas is home to about 102,372 people, and the figures above are the same ones a local HVAC contractor uses to size and quote a system — this site doesn't guess where a real quote would land, it just tells you whether it's worth asking for one. In Wichita Falls, nothing is lost by holding off until the current equipment genuinely fails.

Get quotes from local HVAC contractors before deciding.

More on how this number was built

Every constant behind this page — the 3.03 seasonal COP, the degree-day corrections, the equipment costs — is documented in the methodology guide. At a 13.6°F design temperature, Wichita Falls sits in cold-climate territory; the guide to that class of unit explains why.