Ask around Melissa after a rough storm season and generator installs come up more than almost any other electrical topic — a direct result of Oncor keeping the lights on reliably most of the year, right up until a summer thunderstorm or a straight-line wind event knocks out power for a few hours or a few days at a stretch. That’s the headline call, but it’s far from the only one. The same electricians handling backup power are also doing panel work for homeowners adding a pool or a workshop, wiring in EV chargers as more Melissa driveways get a second car that plugs in, and chasing down the occasional flickering circuit in a house barely out of its first year. Here’s who’s actually doing that work locally.
ABR Electric, based at 1971 Univ Business Dr in McKinney, is a veteran-owned shop holding Texas electrical contractor license TECL #27762. They’re a certified Tesla installer and a Generac dealer, which covers two of the more common upgrade requests from Melissa homeowners right now — EV charging and whole-home backup power — without needing to bring in a separate specialist for either.
True Power Electric LLC is genuinely based in Melissa itself rather than serving it from a neighboring city, and shows up as an active member of the Melissa Area Chamber of Commerce. That local footing tends to matter for smaller, faster jobs — a tripped breaker that keeps tripping, a dead outlet, a ceiling fan install — where a company headquartered fifteen minutes away can turn a same-day call around more easily.
Reynolds Electric Heating & Air Conditioning Service, LLC, out of Sherman, has been in business since 1974 and covers Melissa as part of a broader Texoma and Collin County service territory. That kind of tenure is worth something on trickier diagnostic work, like intermittent electrical issues that don’t show up consistently enough for a newer company to have seen the pattern before.
Adis Electric, based in Plano, is a family-owned contractor serving the McKinney and Melissa corridor with a solid independent review record. They’re a reasonable second call for panel work or rewiring on older sections of Melissa near the historic Cooper Street area, where the housing stock predates the recent subdivision boom and occasionally still has electrical systems that haven’t been touched since the original build.
A practical note for anyone in one of Melissa’s newer subdivisions: builder electrical work is typically covered under warranty for the first year, and sometimes longer for specific components, so a breaker that won’t stay reset or an outlet that never worked right might be the builder’s problem to fix rather than a bill for you. Check your closing documents before paying out of pocket for something that could be a warranty claim.
For anyone considering a whole-home generator after a rough outage season, it’s worth getting quotes from at least two electricians rather than the first name that comes up in a search, since sizing a generator to your actual panel and typical load varies more than most people expect, and an undersized unit installed cheaply ends up being a second expense within a few years.
Why Panel Upgrades Come Up So Often Here
A lot of Melissa homes were built to a standard 150 or 200-amp panel sized for a typical builder spec, which works fine until a homeowner starts adding load: a pool with its own pump and heater, a workshop or home gym in the garage, an EV charger, or a generator transfer switch. Any of those additions can push a panel close to its rated capacity, and an electrician worth hiring will actually calculate the added load rather than just installing the new circuit and hoping the panel holds up. If you’re planning more than one of these additions over the next few years — say, a pool now and an EV charger later — it’s worth mentioning both when you get a quote, since upsizing a panel once tends to cost less than doing a smaller upgrade now and a bigger one again in two years.
EV Chargers and HOA Rules
Most Melissa HOAs don’t restrict EV charger installation itself, since it’s typically inside the garage and out of view from the street, but a few communities do have guidelines around exterior conduit runs if the charger is mounted on an exterior wall rather than inside. It’s a minor check compared to the exterior paint and fence rules that trip people up more often, but worth a quick look at your HOA’s architectural guidelines before an electrician runs conduit somewhere visible from the street.
Storm Season and Surge Protection
Beyond generators, whole-home surge protection is a cheaper, less-discussed upgrade worth asking about, particularly given how many newer Melissa homes are packed with electronics — smart thermostats, video doorbells, networked appliances — that are more vulnerable to a voltage spike during a storm than older, simpler home wiring ever had to account for. A whole-panel surge protector installed by a licensed electrician is a relatively small add to any other electrical work being done and can save a homeowner from replacing several hundred dollars of electronics after one bad storm.
