Everyone wants to find the best contractor. Yet, there are certainly many people that would probably settle for a competent drywall repair service spokane valley. Some consumers may have had a bad experience with a contractor in the past or have heard “horror stories” about someone else’s bad contractor experience.
In reality, most contractors are honest people just looking to make an honest living. The “best” contractor you can find will be one that tells you what will happen before it happens, and then make it happen.
As long as you as the homeowner are satisfied with the work and the contractor did what he said he would do and he did so in the manner that was discussed, there is not much more that you can ask of a contractor. Unfortunately, we as consumers are brainwashed about price shopping. Homeowners want a contractor that outperforms others and yet costs less.
Often times, when it comes to contractors, the cliche that you get what you pay for is true. A quality contractor probably performs a high volume of work. After all, if the contractor’s work is of high quality, the contractor will likely earn business through referrals and word of mouth. Because of the high demand, a good contractor does not necessarily need to try to “sell you on cost.” The best contractors will sell you on quality and let you decide if it is worth the cost. And, in most cases, it is.
A lesser contractor may be more likely to be “hungrier for a paycheck.” If this is the case, the contractor may take on a project that he is not qualified to perform. He may quote you the lowest possible price simply to earn the contract and then try to make money by cutting corners, not paying his installers or leaving the job unfinished. These are the situations that homeowners dread and yet they likely can be avoided.
When choosing a contractor to perform a home improvement, you, as the consumer, should change your “lowest price possible” mentality to the extent that you understand that purchasing a home improvement is not equivalent to purchasing a pair of jeans. When you go to the mall in search of jeans, you may simply look for the cheapest pair you can find. In your mind, all jeans are basically the same, so as long as they fit and look ok, you simply want to spend the least amount of money on them as possible. Again, this is not a bad philosophy- for jeans.
A home improvement is different. Of course, there is the price difference. Anytime you are getting ready to spend thousands of dollars on anything, more thought is generally required and recommended. But there is also the fact that your home is an investment- probably your largest investment. Therefore, most improvements are an investment as well. Spending, say, $10,000 on siding should net you a certain percentage of that cost whenever you sell or refinance your home.
If the siding is installed incorrectly, however, you just spent $10,000 for nothing. In fact, you may end up spending even more simply to fix a bad job. At some point, the home improvement turns into a bad investment and this is what many people do not realize until it is too late. Someone in this situation would gladly have paid someone $11,000 to perform the job correctly the first time. So, sometimes trying to save a grand can cost you 10.
The other main difference between buying jeans and purchasing a home improvement is that, if the jeans turn out to be of poor quality, you can always simply purchase another pair. Things are not always as simple (or cheap) when trying to fix a poor quality contractor’s shortcomings. Depending on the type of project and the scale of the mistakes, the correction can sometimes cost more than the cost of the entire original project. Imagine being stuck in that situation.
So, when deciding on which contractor to choose for your next home improvement project, remember that, unlike when you shop for jeans, cheapest does not always mean best. In fact, it often mean the opposite. There may only be so much of a difference between the most expensive jeans and the $10 variety. But there could be a huge difference when talking about contractors. Try to keep in mind that spending a bit more now is well worth it for a long term investment such as your home.
