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