Chimney and fireplace work in Hopkins

The Minneapolis Threshing Machine Company opened here in 1887, and a land company built housing for its workers the same year. The settlement incorporated as the Village of West Minneapolis in 1893, took the name Hopkins in 1928 after early homesteader and postmaster Harley H. Hopkins, and became a city in 1947. The Raspberry Festival has run since the mid-1930s.

The housing is unusually mixed for the west metro. The 2024 American Community Survey counts 10,146 units, of which only 29.4 percent are single-family detached, and 9.0 percent were built before 1940 and 17.8 percent from 1940 to 1959, with a median year of 1973. Hopkins also has one of the lower gas-heat shares in the metro, 58.3 percent, with electricity at 33.1 percent.

Old houses near the factory district

The early 1900s houses closest to downtown often have a single brick chimney that has vented a coal furnace, then an oil or gas furnace, and now perhaps only a water heater. Minnesota's fuel gas rules (Minn. R. 1346.5501) call for an approved metal liner in any masonry chimney that vents gas. A liner sized to what's left in the flue typically runs $625 to $2,250 in aluminum or $900 to $3,800 in stainless.

Townhomes, condos and gas fireplaces

In attached housing, the fireplace is often a factory-built gas unit. When it fails, the cause is usually a small part: igniter $90 to $150, thermocouple $150 to $350, thermopile or gas valve $150 to $300. Before any work in a shared building, check what your association allows on the roof.

The nearest NOAA station, Flying Cloud airport in Eden Prairie, averages about 145 nights a year at or below freezing and about 23 at or below zero in its 1991–2020 normals, enough to crack a crown or rust a chase cover in a few seasons.

Where we work in Hopkins

The Avenues · Bellgrove · Hobby Acres · Minnehaha Oaks · Park Valley