Had roofers redo the roof awhile ago. I checked the lawn for errent nails thinking I’d find none or two. It went from mildy to infuriating.
My personal policy is to leave my jobsite cleaner than I found it. Nothing is more unprofessional than making the customer clean up after you.
Mine dropped a ton of debris on the cover of our hot tub, poking numerous holes in it. They had plywood, why not drop a sheet or two on top of the hot tub during demolition?? Sigh.
So how did you get them to show up at all? The ones where I live don’t even answer their phone or emails.
I go through my insurance company. They’ll give me a list of trusted contractors and I haven’t had an issue. This is quite dependant on locality I’m sure.
I’ve tried to subtly and not so subtly hint to the electrician that I’m using on my jobs that the tiny cut-offs of wire he leaves after laying on the floor instead of picking them up might not seem like a big deal to him but the last thing the customer remembers is having to clean after them and it’s not a good long-term business strategy.
You have to say these words: “hey there sparky, pick up your fucking garbage or I’m finding a different electrician.” Hints, even not very subtle hints, will never stick.
And he’s going to say “ha ha good luck with that!”
They always do. Sparkies are solitary creatures, convinced they are the only electricians that exist. If you put two of them in the room together they’ll whip each other 12ga wiring until a clear victor emerges. Weirdly enough, the rules for these matches are followed to a tighter standard than the standards for which color wire to use in any given situation.
I had my siding replaced. I found like 20 times that many. I’m just lucky I have a magnetic collector from my woodshop, or I’d still be picking them up 6 years later.
You’re lucky they were magnetic. Some remodelers I hired left a bunch of carbon steel blades in 2 or 3 spots on the lawn. Fortunately they were about 1"x.5" so pretty easy to see, and I don’t have kids. I tried to magnet them up at first and found they were not.
dont pay the 2nd half until they clean
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My roofers did a good job of cleanup, I was happy with them. Definitely found a couple, but I don’t expect perfection, I know it’s a losing battle.
What’s crazy is I found one probably a year after they did the roof. No idea how it managed to go undetected so long, but that’s the way she goes I suppose. And I have a modest house on a modest property.
I went with a local roofing company where the guy seemed trustworthy and they had good reviews.
Worked out well, their crew had big magnets on wheels and did multiple sweeps.
The only downside is I thought it would be fun to go around with a magnet and hear “ping ping ping” as it found nails but none to be found.
I consider this complete blind luck though. I think the issue with roofing is it is a service you need every decade or two, so every time I need roofing done I feel like I’m just blindly picking out a company.
Shout out to Hibco Roofing in central ohio though, they did a great job.
I mostly picked the guy based on his small talk about leaving Able Roofing at 20 years because “private equity came in and fucked everything up and I couldn’t just do a $100 fix for someone if I could sell them a brand new roof.” And how “these fucking datacenters are ruining Ohio”
I was sold
Yeah, I’m purely a vibe check homeowner when it comes to hiring contractors, which I’m only doing for medium to large projects. Having a guy talk to me the way yours did to you would’ve definitely pushed the needle in the right direction. I just find that sensible people do sensible work.
“He lives in a house, a very modest house, in the country.”
Pulp reference!
My roofers used a magnet to collect them. I found maybe two or three after they left. I checked recommendations on Nextdoor app, and got three quotes. The owner came out for the quote, got up on the roof to inspect, and he was also there for the job. 2000 sf roof, they started at six AM and were done by lunch, they had another job after lunch. I’ve seem some roofs in the neighborhood take three days.
I was very happy with the job they did. $12,000.
Edit: I should have said that the price included replacing two small skylights--which he insisted on doing “for free” because he said they always fail around the same time the roof gets replaced--removing an old swamp cooler and patching the hole, and adding four turtle vents. So, a little more than just replacing the shingles.
Our roof was done in one day, but a neighbor had his roof done, and it took them at least a week. Smaller house than ours, too. I don’t know if there was some complications that interfered, but it looked like a pretty standard job to me. Most roof jobs I’ve seen are a day or two.
That price is amazing. I considered a friend that does it as a pro. Probably would’ve got it at 2/3rds the price.
I always price out the cost of materials and estimated labor (full fair wage) before getting bids on this type of stuff. This gives me a rough estimate of where the pricing should be. Generally add I add in a 30% markup to cover overhead. Mainly because I can do all the work myself, I just don’t have the time.
It was stupid how much difference there was on the quotes for my roof replacement, $12k-$18k. Estimated CoG’s and Labor $9K
Now painting the house afterwards had an even larger variation in pricing. It went from $6k-$22k. It took 6 quotes before somebody came reasonable. Estimated CoG’s and Labor = $4K. The guy who gave me a bid for $22k got laughed at and told to fuck right off.
Got mine and detached garage done for 6200. Took fucking 2 weeks though. Fucker wanted to be paid in full. I refused. He finally sent his guys to finish. But they left behind a gaint latter that I still have to this day.
Most expensive ladder you’ve ever bought, but at least it came with a free roof!
The hustle to make 24k in a day is impressive and the definition of high paid hard work.
Worth it!!!
Still cleaning up roofing debris from when my roof was replaced in 2014, or before that, and have found plenty of pieces of glass from old windows, and tile pieces that were probably from the original 1956 build…
Builders need to remember to keep it clean and clean up after, 100%!
It seems like they used to “out of sight, out of mind” things. I discovered carpet on my neighbors side digging near the fence line…
I’m pretty sure I found the old back stoop burried in the yard.
Did the same. I’ve got kids running around and told them, before starting, it was important I don’t have a yard full of nails. I found about 50 and demanded them to sweep again. Even after that I found more. I decided to pay my kids $1 per nail, so they scavaged and found more heh.
Now if one of your kids finds a nail by accidentally stepping on it, they may request compensation in the form of a dollar for finding the nail. 😌
An enterprising young kid would buy some nails from the hardware store and slip some extras in here and there.
Might have to go over it a few more times. Friends come over with their dogs, so those bare paws are concerning.
Need to run a floor magnet all around the yard, especially within 3-4m of the house.
That’s what the roofers they paid were supposed to do.
If I didn’t already have a sweep. I probably would’ve just accpted that they did their job.
doesn’t matter the location or the company. nobody gives a shit about workman’s pride.
it’s all corporate now. hurry up, do the job for twice the cost, and under budget to maximize profit.
if I was 10 years younger I’d roof my own house, but I’m just too old to be up there all alone.
Yep… we had maybe 100 of those green nail things on all sides of our house after we got our roof replaced. Really unsafe and infuriating.
I made the mistake of having expectations. They were on the upper end of the qoutes too.
I hope you complained to them and showed them the evidence. Documentation is so important, and talking to them about how they would like to remedy the situation.
Shit you found my nail stash. Sorry ive been dumping them in your yard
My stash now, just need to straighten them out in the vise.
I had a similar situation. I called and told them they owed me for 2 hours of my time as a contactor to clean up and sent pics. I got $375 off my bill.
