1. Visit their Showroom
Visit their showroom to see the actual products before you visit the home. You can tell a lot about a company by the visit. Do you like the products offered? Will the company perform the work you want done?
2. Find Their Payment Options
The various payment options offered by a contractor can tell you a lot about the business. Most contractors take checks or some sort of cash option. But is that the best way for a homeowner to pay for the services? A contractor that offers you to pay via credit card or via a 3rd party bank has gone through a financial background check to be able to offer these options.
3. Check if they are licensed
Either a general contractor’s license or plumbing license is required for most work being performed in the kitchen and bath, but that doesn’t mean all companies have a license. Check to make sure. In North Carolina, this means the licensed business has its financial documents reviewed once a year, in South Carolina it is every other year.
4. Find References
Any business can provide you with three references. These will all be good ones too. However, there is one question you can ask the representative pricing your project that will separate a good company from a bad one. Ask for the person to tell you about a job that didn’t get performed correctly or had a warranty issue? No company is perfect on every job, so what would it mean to you if a representative told you the company has never had issues? Listen to how the company handled the issue. Also, Google reviews are free for you and the business, unlike most other review services. It is a great place to see how a company has performed over time.
5. Look For A Company That Fits You
There is an old saying regarding businesses. A company can be two of the following, good, fast, or inexpensive, but only two. This is so true when it comes to home improvement and you need to decide which two are most important to you. A remodeler with a fast lead time, I can be there next week, either has to offer lower quality products/labor or has to be more expensive. Example: Let’s say a company offers good products and can get to your job next week. It may just be timing, but typically it means the company must have a higher price to accommodate for times when there are no orders. Otherwise, they would have to send installers home without pay when there is no work and then the quality goes down due to the high turnover of installers.
