Voted Nextdoor Neighborhood Fave Plumber For 5th Straight Year
Our Nextdoor neighbors have voted The Aussie Plumber a Nextdoor Neighborhood Fave for the fifth straight year.
Founder James Hill calls the five-peat a “team-effort” and shines the spotlight on the members of the community who decide on their Neighborhood Fave plumber.
"Five years running, and every one of those votes came from someone who's let us into their home. Nextdoor doesn’t give Neighborhood Fave awards to just any business. The award is earned one service request at a time. To everyone across the neighborhood who voted for us, thank you mates! It really means a lot."
What A Neighborhood Fave Actually Is
A neighborhood Fave is the everyday recommendation a verified neighbor leaves on a The Aussie Plumber’s Nexdoor profile page. Verified means Nextdoor has confirmed the neighbor lives where they say they live. Neighbors can leave one any month of the year, and other neighbors searching for a plumber see them.
The award is a separate thing. Once a year, in September, Nextdoor asks verified neighbors to vote for the local businesses they like best. For 2026, voting ran September 9 through 30. Winners are decided neighborhood by neighborhood, so a plumber in Paradise Valley is measured against the plumbers who work your streets, not against every company in the Valley.
There is no way to buy in, no advertising path, and no nominating yourself. Each win puts a trophy badge on the business's Nextdoor page, and The Aussie Plumber's page now carries five, 2022 through 2026. By Nextdoor's own count, last year's awards drew 6.9 million votes across 1.7 million businesses.
What Earns A Neighborhood Fave Award
Inside the company there is a saying the crew hears from Hill himself, usually in the shop in the morning.
"We say winning trust is the ultimate currency around here, and this award is our receipt for it. Show up when you said you would, be transparent, and don't sell them something they don't need. Do that for five years and your neighbors notice. Slip once and they notice that too."
Behind the saying is a short list of habits. Let’s start with The Aussie Plumber’s free estimates. The Aussie Plumber covers the cost of sending an expert plumber to your home to figure out what exactly is going on with the issue.
This free estimate brings tremendous value to the homeowner who may or may not know the root cause of the issue. It could be something bigger but oftentimes it's a small repair that can bring peace of mind to the homeowner. The price is always given up front right there at the home.
There are no "got ya" with The Aussie Plumber. What's more is, if the price is more than you want to pay at once, the company's Aussie Up program lets you pay later at the same price, with no interest and no fees. The problem itself gets explained in plain English (with a slight Aussie accent depending on who your plumber is): what broke, what the fix involves, and what can safely wait.
You can ask what caused the problem, what the repair involves, and why this is the recommended approach. The plumber provides a detailed visual service report on what they find, so you can see the inside of your own wall or your own pipe and judge the recommendation for yourself.
If a plumber tells you there’s a pinhole leak in a pipe, there is footage of the pipe, and you can show it to whoever helps you make decisions in your house. That holds when a parent or a relative answers the door and someone else pays the bill: the explanation and the footage can go to the person who decides, even if that person is not the one who opened the door.
You get a text when the plumber is on the way, with a link that tracks the van (think Uber for your plumber), and text updates while the work is being done. If you are not home when the work happens, the texts and the footage still reach you, so you can see what the technician found from wherever you are. The written price comes by text or email, and you can approve it the same way, without being in the room.
Shoe covers go on at the door (a sign of respect for your home). The van arrives when the company said it would. The phone is answered 24/7 365 days. The plumbers doing this work are background-checked, and the company is licensed by the Arizona Registrar of Contractors (ROC 335675, R-37), bonded, and insured.
The same habits show up where homeowners write their own accounts: at the time of writing this article, more than 1,000 five-star Google reviews at a 5.0 average, and 77 five-star Better Business Bureau reviews alongside an A+ rating.
Earning Homeowner Trust
Think about the last time something went wrong with your plumbing, or imagine the next one. Water where it should not be. A water heater that quits heating water. A cost you cannot guess at. In a single moment you are deciding three things: what the repair is, what it should cost, and who you are willing to open your front door to. Most of us cannot judge the first two, and the third is a stranger. That is a lot to carry into one phone call.
A recommendation from someone on your street takes the first piece of that weight off before you ever consider who to call. That neighbor already ran the experiment you are about to run. They know whether the van showed up when it was supposed to and whether the bill matched the free quote provided.
So you finally call The Aussie Plumber, and your plumber is standing in your kitchen, and everything the neighbor promised is either happening in front of you or it is not. People remember that hour in detail, accurately enough to retell it via a 5-star review or a vote on Nextdoor’s Neighborhood Fave award.
For The Aussie Plumber, a job done well becomes a story to tell. First impressions mean a lot but lasting impressions mean more. That is how reassurance travels from one house to the next at full value; bringing plumbing peace of mind one home at a time.
One Year, Three Milestones
The fifth Fave arrived in the same year that The Aussie Plumber celebrated its 5th year anniversary. Opened on September 30, 2021, James and Michelle Hill, has a vision for how The Aussie Plumber would find its place in a crowded market of residential plumbing businesses. And the growth since opening day has come one van at a time, as the recommendations added up.
The company HQ outgrew James’ Shaeborhood living room and now resides inside an office space right next to Trader Joes on 4600 E Shea Blvd Ste 203, Phoenix, AZ 85028, United States. Along the way the company has supported Recycle Your Bicycle, which helps foster and adopted children have a chance to learn how to ride a bike, and made a donation toward musical instrument repairs at Shadow Mountain High School. And while five years is not long, it is certainly long enough for a pattern to show.
This year, 2026, brought one more piece of news, from a different direction. The Aussie Plumber is a 2026 BBB Torch Awards for Ethics finalist, one of three finalists in its category, with winners to be announced November 19 at the Arizona Biltmore. The Torch Awards look at how a business is run, its ethics rather than its size. The company finds out the result the same night everyone else does.
About The Aussie Plumber
The Aussie Plumber is a locally owned residential plumbing business located in Phoenix, Arizona, serving homeowners throughout Maricopa County, along with select light commercial accounts such as small businesses and restaurants. Founded on September 30, 2021, by James and Michelle Hill, the company specializes in water heaters, water treatment, drain service, whole-home repipes, and plumbing inspections, and is known for upfront flat-rate pricing and plain-English explanations.
The Aussie Plumber has been voted a Nextdoor Neighborhood Fave for the past five consecutive years, from 2022 through 2026, holds an A+ rating with the Better Business Bureau, is a 2026 BBB Torch Awards for Ethics finalist, and has more than 1,000 Google reviews at a 5.0 average. The Aussie Plumber is licensed by the Arizona Registrar of Contractors (ROC 335675, R-37).
Follow The Aussie Plumber:Facebook, Instagram, X, LinkedIn. On YouTube and The Aussie Plumber Podcast, the company explains plumbing to homeowners, so you can learn about it outside an appointment and in your own time. Also on YouTube: The Aussie Explores.
