My front porch needs town down and rebuilt. The beams in the roof suffered from long term water intrusion which led to a carpenter infestation. And on top of that, or rather below that, the concrete blocks and concrete pad of the porch floor has settled badly and cracked. It all needs to go.
I'm ready to get this taken care of, but I'm struggling to find someone to answer my calls, let alone do the work. The big name home builders and contractors locally don't want to touch it because it's too small of a job. And the small guys just don't answer their phones at all. The one that did just failed to communicate that he wasn't going to come and make a quote like he told me, meaning that I've burned a day of vacation and missed an autocross test and tune for no good reason.
How do you go about finding a good contractor? What are some indicators of a bad contractor that I should watch for?
The only answer I've ever found was to just do it myself.
One idea is to find your local code inspection office. Ask them who they recommend. They probably can't officially recommend anyone, but they can provide a list of all the contractors who have pulled permits recently in your area. That's a good list to start calling. Picking the good from the bad is still on you.
I think svrex made a manifesto on this topic at some point. Might be able to dig it up.
Looks like this thread from 4 years ago. Let me read through it...
I'm convinced it's luck of the draw at this point.
The only consistent luck I had when I lived in Tulsa was using Angie's List.
Yep. That had to be the thread.
SVreX said:
...the best place to find contractors in priority order:
1- Ask material vendors (they know who is busy, and who they are selling to, and who pays their bills)
2- Ask for referrals from trade professionals like architects and interior designers (they know who they have been successful working with, and know lots of people)
3- Ask for referrals from people who have recently hired contractors (they know if they had a good experience or not, but only know about 1 contractor, and have minimal knowledge of good practices)
4- Search online (Angie's List, social media, etc)- the worst option.
Most people start with # 4.
Looks like I need to find some material vendors, and maybe an architect to draw up some plans.
It's luck and word of mouth at this point in time. There are a lot more crappy contractors out there than there are good ones.
I will say the cheapest is probably going to be moderately horrible. We deal with a lot of low bidders. The quality of the work they do is unbelievably bad. A lot of them throw out stupid low numbers to get the job, expecting to make up the difference in change orders. When the change orders don't come in, their work quality gets worse. Assuming you can get them to finish the job to start with.
We are having to take care of a bunch of warranty work for a company that the owners threw off a job. I'm amazed at the amount of extension cord they ran through walls and above drop ceilings. Stuff that just makes me shake my head in disgust. The good news is I'm making a killing on fixing all the sub-par work they have done.
Based on my experience, do NOT ask a Realtor (TM). They are all about networking and will recommend someone that they want favor with. I've never had a good recommendation from a Realtor (TM).
I like the material vendor suggestion. Same way that if you want to know what cars are reliable, ask a machine shop. My local machine shop saw my Toyota truck with the 3.0 V6 and said "boy, those things have paid a lot of bills". Then I had to pull the engine out...
I'm convinced that you get to pick 2 of the following:
- Good Quality Work
- Good Price (Note that I said good price, not fair price or right price - the fair price is probably not good)
- Responsive/Timely
If you can get a contractor, any contractor, to actually call you back, you're doing way better than me. In 10 years of owning a home, I've gotten one (1) contractor who is willing to do residential work to call me back. He then passed on even bidding it. I've probably called 30 different companies.
I either end up doing it myself, or hiring my wife's uncle who is slower than molasses. Shows up at 9:30am, leaves before 3pm. Multiple days off during the week to take care of personal things.
Yeah, I'm not looking to get the lowest bid around. I want the work done right and I'm willing to pay what it takes to get that.
SVreXmade some good suggestions in the thread linked above. The big thing I got from it was that I jumped a step in the process. I need to get the plan defined first, which means architect or engineer. THEN they and/or I can start looking for quotes from contractors to do the work to the plan. I've never done this before and assumed I was supposed to start with contractors.
I've done more internet research and found a local architect/builder that is a small family business. Their website seemed to lean more towards residential than big commercial. They answered their phone, I explained what I wanted, and he said that he will call me early next week when he can stop by and look over the project and talk goals. It's a start.
I'm in the middle of a complete exterior rework of my place - roof, wood repair, paint, and eventually redoing the deck as well. I asked for recommendations on FB and that was useless. I just started googling the services I needed and the area. Threw out anyone that looked obviously shady or shoddy, cross referenced online reviews from multiple places - and I mean READ the reviews - and backed that against better business bureau ratings. Then I talked to a couple supply houses, but even those are getting to be less than trustworthy. In the end I had 4 firms each quote roof and paint. I ended up using the one that had the best combined reviews and ratings that could general contract both paint and roof. That way I have one finger to point if there's an issue, plus I came out $2k cheaper than running separate jobs through the next best individual vendors.
So far timelines have been...well, they've been fairly close. The quality of roof work was acceptable if not stunning. I had some minor issues that took a couple tries to get fixed correctly, but they've been pleasant and responsive through the process which is about as good as it gets I think.
I feel very lucky thus far. Residential contractors are the only category of service I trust less than car repair shops. This kind of project is just going to be a PITA, and I think no matter what you do there's a chance you'll have issues with the contractor. The same guy who's done a good job or me is doing a coworker's rental properties too. They failed to do a walkaround project meeting she requested on one house and as a result they are having to completely strip and redo the roof they just put up. To their credit, they are covering the cost as they should. There are going to be mistakes and minor reworks on a large project. As long as the contractor will work through them with me, I'm satisfied if not exactly happy.
I wouldn't use word of mouth like social media or Angie's List for several reasons. First, the type of people who use Angie's List are sometimes the least knowledgeable about home repairs. That means they aren't experienced enough to be able to tell a good job vs a hack job. All they know is "the work is done and I paid less with John than I would have with Tim." They might not have the most discerning eye. I'm reminded of my neighbor who finally got his first car at 38 years old and it was a badly faded Fox body Mustang. He took it to Maaco and got their cheapest paint job and he was just floored at how great it looked. I thought it looked like it was painted with a Hershey bar and masked with duct tape, but since he knew less than nothing about cars, it looked great to him.
Angie's list, Home Advisor, and BBB are all pay-to-play. BBB doesn't actually care what customers think of you as long as you pay to be a member. If the BBB gets a complaint they reach out to the business to get a resolution... which could be anything. I once had a completely unreasonable customer who just wanted to weasel out of paying his repair bill on a Dodge pickup and complained to the BBB. My resolution suggestion was to "wait an additional 2 days before filing a lien and charging daily storage fees so the customer could have more time to acquire the funds to settle his bill." I probably could have said "willing to trade for a hand job" and BBB would have been OK with it. BBB is there for the business, not the customer.
The vendor route is good. Asking at the Pro Desk at HD or Lowes can be hit or miss, but often it's a hit. HD pro associates deal daily with surprisingly big players in the area. I had a contractor who was THE GUY to know if you wanted a custom house done, and he had hundreds of employees in 5 states. All of his supplies were funneled through my desk at HD. For the most part, HD Pros will gladly recommend a contractor to you because they know that contractor will be coming to their desk to buy the materials. Some HD Pros who "bleed orange" will want to set you up with a consult, generate a sales lead, and do what they're trained to do... but honestly it's a pain in the butt to do that. Pro associates think they're special and don't need to do it the HD way. Just ask for the Pro Desk dept supervisor, or find the oldest person at the pro desk. Some pro desks suck. Ours rocked.
Short of that, just call for 5 estimates. Ask them how they would do it. Get a feel for their personality. If they just look at it and give you a number, pass. If they take the time to talk to you about it and give you a good price, go for it.
