Finding A Contractor You Can Rely On

You have a project you want to do on your home. Maybe it's a small bathroom remodel or a larger kitchen upgrade. Perhaps it's even an addition. Regardless of the type of project you know that you just need someone to do the job.

How do you find that person? Conventional wisdom says that you ask your friends, get a name or two and go from there. You can take that route but there's a good chance you're not going to land the best person for the job. And if you don't find the right contractor, you risk the potential hassles that go along with those contractor horror stories you read and hear about.

Be assured that there is a contractor out there who can do a great job for you but it takes some effort on your part to find them.

Take Your Time, Chunk It Down and Broaden Your Scope

Finding a good contractor isn't necessarily hard to do. What frustrates most people is that it takes some time to go through the process. And it's a process that requires some patience too. But if you break it down into logical steps you'll make your time more efficient and you'll have a clearer view of who the best contractor for your job will be.

Here are the basic steps in finding the best person for the job:

1. Gather a pool of contractor candidates (in other words, get enough names to increase your chance of finding the right person)
2. Get clear on what you're looking for from these candidates and prep for your interviews
3. Interview your candidates and ask the right questions, the ones that will give you insight into the contractor's performance, competence and "fit" with your project.
4. Talk to the contractor's past customers (the references) and ask them the right questions
5. Make your selection

The key the finding the right person to do the job is giving yourself a large enough pool of candidates to choose from. The more candidates you find, the better your chance of getting the right contractor. Simply getting a couple of referrals or just cold-calling some contractors won't get you what you're looking for. It might get you a few leads but in order to find the best person you need a larger group of people to choose from.

And let's be clear about what it means to hire the "best" contractor: it means someone who's a good fit not only from a technical skills perspective but from a management and interpersonal skills point of view too. To say it more simply, you want someone who you can get along with and who holds your home and your project in high regard, and not as just another job on the list.

If you're remodeling your home your contractor is someone you'll see and communicate with on a daily basis. Do you want someone you will get along with on a professional level or will you dread seeing that person drive up to your home each morning?

Does this mean mistakes don't happen or issues don't arise with good contractors? No, it doesn't. But if the person you hire is someone that is your advocate, knows how to handle surprises that might arise and has good people skills, it makes the whole remodeling experience much smoother.

Do Your Homework To Assure Yourself You'll Find The Right Person

If you give yourself enough candidates to choose from, ask the right questions, follow up with their past customers, (in essence, 'doing your homework'), you're almost assured of finding someone that meets your criteria.

Think about it for a moment. If you owned your own business you would only hire the people that met your standards of excellence and passed your "test" (your questions and review) of their capabilities. You'd check their previous job references and carefully consider the opinion of their past employers.

It's no different when you're hiring a contractor. You're in charge here. And you're completely capable of finding the right person for your particular project.