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Entry bubble Hiring Home Improvement Contractors

By: Sommer | November 30, 2007 | Category: Home and Family

So, I’m sure that most of America is wondering how our painting went last weekend. Unfortunately, we didn’t get any done although my house is cleaner than it’s been in a very long time. Since, by the time Thanksgiving Eve rolled around all we wanted to do was veg out in front of the TV with some junk food we didn’t get furniture moved or take our planned final trip to the home improvement store Wednesday night. Then, Thursday morning, as we lolled around the house, we decided it would be so much easier to “just hire someone” to do the work for us.

Little did I know, “just hiring someone” is almost as much work as just doing it ourselves!Handyman

As far as I can tell, we’ll need to hire 3 separate contractors to help us complete the items on our checklist. One to replace our windows (we’ve still got the originals from the ‘40’s), one to fix our drywall (the last person did an AWFUL job), and one to paint. If we’re lucky, maybe the same person can fix the drywall and paint. Yay!

The first thing we'll need to do is find a few qualified companies to get bids from. I plan to start with:

If, like us, you live in a larger metro area like DC, the Twin Cities, or San Francisco you have access to Consumers’ Checkbook, a great subscription service that rates and reviews local contractors. Another subscription service, Angie’s List, serves 124 communities in the U.S. and provides consumers with the opportunity to submit their experiences and also helps with resolving complaints. 

Of course, the tried and true “ask your neighbors” method also works well. 

We’re planning to start with the window replacement so once I find some qualified companies to do the work, I’ll ask at least 3 of them to submit bids. Stay tuned to see what happens. My husband and I are new to the home improvement game so I welcome any of your advice. Please leave tips in the comments!

| View Comments [2] | envelope E-mail This Entry | Tags: company   contractor   hire   home   improvement   paint   sommer   windows  

Comments (2):

blue comment bubble Posted by stylin_mom on November 30, 2007 at 10:03 AM EST

Welcome to the wonderful world of being a home owner! Just a suggestion - a friend of mine referred me to Service Magic (http://www.servicemagic.com/). You have to answer a questionnaire. Then you start getting calls and e-mails. At that point, my husband cross-references them with the Better Business Bureau's Membership. We've used this twice service - one for painters and the other for tree trimming. Good luck and keep us posted.

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blue comment bubble Posted by Citizen Jmaximus on December 02, 2007 at 01:02 PM EST

Good tips... Only problem I found [learned this the hard way] is asking the right questions. Is the contractor telling the truth that you need a ¾’Th pipe, not a 5/8’Th per code and does it make any real difference? Unless you know a bit about some of these things you’re still open to bill padding...

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