As the son of an HVAC contractor who grew up doing repair and maintenance work each summer, I must say that Eddie Simmons is exactly the kind of contractor you want to work on your home - he's thorough and thoughtful, and explains your situation, his recommendations, and alternatives so that you know a) He knows what he's talking about and b) What your options are. He was very reasonably priced, friendly, professional, timely, and efficient, and I will be recommending him to anyone I know in need of a plumber. Any problems I have in the future, I will be calling him, because I trust and know he can fix it.
Allow me to elaborate:
My wife and I had just purchased our first home in June, and within one month, the 15 year old water heater stopped working. I knew it was a possibility when we bought the place, given the age of the unit, but it was still pretty annoying. When it happened though, my wife was out of town, and I had been working 12 hour days in DC, and so it was going to be difficult to schedule someone to come look at it.
I put in an information request on Yelp, actually to a different plumber, but added E & S and 8 others because I could. In my message, I explained that my pilot light would not light, and suspected there might be a problem with a gas valve. Nearly all 10 contractors got back go me pretty quickly - some said they couldn't help, some quoted a price without explanation for the suspected repair, several said to just change the unit, but Eddie actually explained things to me. He said that if it was a gas valve in the unit, given the age we'd have to get a replacement part from the manufacturer because nobody carries it anymore. If the manufacturer had it, they'd have to ship it in from out of state, which would mean waiting an extra 2 days for hot water. Given the typical 12 year lifespan of a unit, they'd recommend I replace it anyway, but the choice was ultimately up to me. He quoted me a reasonable price for a Ruud replacement and said if I could get home by 6:15 he could install it that very day. I asked a few follow-up questions - does he offer a warranty, etc - and he replied quickly each time (2 year warranty for all of his work). Our whole conversation gave me great confidence in his abilities, and I chose him over everyone else.
That evening, he showed up right on time and spent the next 2-3 hours changing out the water heater and installing a new expansion tank. He made sure to stay around a few minutes extra to make sure there were no problems with the unit after it fired up, and only left after he was confident everything was in good order. He cleaned up all of his work and hauled my old tank away. We shook hands, I thanked him for his great work, and he headed home while I went to take a nice hot shower.