How to woo a contractor
Attempts to repair deck and landscape backyard foiled by unanswered calls, emails
I’ve done a few large projects in the past year and, at some point in each case, I’ve had to put in a call to a pro to tackle a tricky task.
But I’ve found through the past several months that it can be nearly as much work trying to manage contractors as picking up the tools myself.
Take, for example, a contractor my wife and I met in March at Toronto’s National Home Show, where he’d been manning a booth. It was a good place to meet potential customers, he told us.
But perhaps his initial visit to look at our rugged and worn two-storey deck and unkempt backyard made him rethink that strategy.
Standing on the back deck, we pointed at the holes in the boards above our heads and the worrisome way the two two-by-fours supporting the upper balcony were anchored into the deck rather than a concrete footing on the ground. We told him we were open to suggestions for repairing or replacing both decks and perhaps extending the ground-level structure further into the yard.
He promised to get in touch with some proposals and a quote, but we never heard from him again — my followup email and voice message both went unanswered.
We were puzzled but we shook off the feeling of rejection by returning our focus to renovating the living and dining room.
However, as the temperatures climbed, the weeds started reclaiming the backyard.
We replaced the shed but, even with barbecue season upon us, we realized we were spending very little time outdoors, trying to block from our minds just how bad it looked.
Finally, we both agreed repairing or replacing our existing deck and overhauling the entire yard, with more mulch and perhaps less grass, was a priority.
So we started looking for a landscape contractor who could provide us with an inspiring idea and a plan to execute their vision.
We consulted a home remodelling and design platform and my local Facebook community group.
We had no idea what it might cost but we were willing to be flexible with our budget if something wowed us.
Instead, we were frustrated as the routine of contractors either not returning calls or not following up on visits became all-too familiar.
There was the general contractor who visited and promised to send a quote when he got back from a cruise (I can only assume and hope he had a safe voyage).
And another contractor who agreed to fit in a visit between some projects he was working on, then rescheduled again and again until I just stopped emailing him.
When I spoke to a friend in my neighbourhood back in July, I heard she and her husband had had a similar experience — they reached out to six different deck contractors, heard back from just two and received a quote from one.
We finally had our third first visit last week, peppered in around several unanswered emails, one callback promising a followup that never came and the aforementioned scheduled visits that never materialized.
I received one second visit, where the company presented a proposed design but, to get it, I had to follow up several times (eventually asking in an email, “Should I be looking elsewhere?”).
Could it be that demand for contractors outstrips supply?
Is it something about my house that scares contractors away?
Or do my wife and I just expect too much?
I asked my friend and contractor Joe Mahoney from Mahoney Interiors what he thought and whether there were any underlying causes (time of year, etc.) that might lead to so few people returning my call. The themes that emerged were: It can be a feast-or-famine industry. If the company is small and it has lots of business, they may just not have the resources to follow up on new leads.
It may be they think the job is too large for them to handle or too small to be worth their time.
The location may be outside of their catchment area.
But sometimes it may just come down to bad management.
As one contractor I spoke with said, if you’re a business that doesn’t return emails or calls, you won’t be getting very much business.
I also suspect that a lot of contractors had one too many experiences of investing time in putting together a quote, with the customer ultimately deciding they can’t afford what’s on offer.
Maybe the trick really is just patience and persistence, because we finally have a couple of quotes to consider.
But unfortunately, as the summer days dwindle, we’re no closer to having the backyard of our dreams than we were in March. Matthew Chung, 33, is a communications manager living in and attempting to renovate his first house in Toronto’s east end. His occasional column appears Friday.