A contractor will bail out if:
a. everything that Ken said.
b. the customer talks too much and/or doesn't know what he wants
c. the customer hints that the project is worth about half.
d. there's something funky at your house, like a botched mess created by the
owner or a previous contractor.
e. the job is too small. Contractors have "overhead" that you can't imagine,
like an hour to get the paint stuff out of the truck and "re-tool" for
woodworking or tiling.
The highly specialized contractors who have a truck stocked up for a single
kind of job, and who charge big rates like plumbers, ... they'll show up
when you want.
-B

wrote in message
...
On 04 Jan 2005 03:08:25 GMT, ojunk (Kim) wrote:

My husband has been remodeling our house himself for the past 5 years.
On the
3 occasions we needed someone to do some work, 2 out of 3 made
appointments and
didn't show up or call, and one showed up once, then never showed up
again.

Is this the norm?

No. It is not the norm, nor is it particularly unusual.
The ones who don't show probably couldn't find a polite way to tell
you over the phone they don't want your busienss; with the fellow
who did show, I'd guess you said something that made hime decide you
were not worth the trouble of following up.

This is not going to make me popular here ... but I'm a remodelling
contractor, and I get a lot of people who want me to rush right over
and give them a free estimate. Even after I give them a ballpark
over the phone .. in the hope of establishing that they at least have
a realistic budget in mind.

Amazingly, they don't believe their project will cost nearly as much
as the last ten identical ones did.... why, their brother in law told
them not to spend more than five thousand ... on a twenty five
thousand dollar project.

I won't make an appointment and not keep it. But I will come to your
home, take a look, come to the conclusion that I don't want you or
don't want your job .. and vanish. I'm not going to spend several
hours costing out a project I have no desire to do.

We are currently finishing a kitchen remodel and need to have a granite
counter
installed. Called a guy who was recommended, he made an appointment to
come
today at 1:00 and show samples, etc. And never showed up or called.
What gives?

Why would you not go to him with a sketch of your counter tops,
including their dimensions? At his show room you can see any number
of edge treatments, quality of granites, sink treatments, etc. And
you can see the raw slabs ... and even the saw they use for cutting
them.

He can give you a good estimate right there, zip out and make a
template at a convenient time.

Any suggestions on finding someone reliable?

No. As I said, my guess would be there is something in your approach
that is not sitting well with prospective contractors. But that is a
guess only.

Thanks,
Kim

HTH

Ken