Essential Questions to Ask a Building Contractor
Choosing and hiring the right building contractors North Wales for your latest home renovation project is not an easy task. The last thing you want to do is fall for the sales pitch of a cowboy builder or con artist, so you’ll need to start vetting potential contractors until you’re feeling confident and comfortable with your chosen contractor.
Building contractors Anglesey are used to being asked all manner of questions prior to taking on a contract – forming a good working relationship with your building contractor from the first meeting is a sure way to have your project running smoothly. People who ask lots of questions are savvy and tend to feel more confident that they’ve made the right choice when they hire a company. Here are the top questions to learn everything you need to know about the contractors you want to work with.
Top Questions to Ask a Building Contractor Before Hiring
Some of these are essential questions that contractors are asked on a daily basis, some are curveballs designed to eliminate potential cowboy builders and others can test the expertise of contractors and give you a better grasp of what the quality of their work will be like.
- Have you completed similar projects before?
A contractor that has completed similar or identical projects to yours is a huge advantage. Don’t just ask in terms of the work, ask about the property as well – do they have experience working on your type of property and know its quirks?
- What safety procedures do you follow?
Professional building contractors will have set procedures to follow if something was to go wrong. They should know how to work safely, bringing their own safety equipment with them. Bad contractors will be easy to spot when you ask this question – they’ll either not know how to answer or give short, quick responses or rattle off healthy and safety laws which they can’t properly explain.
- What is the estimated timeline for completion?
If they can give you a precise timeline when you’ve not given them much detail or if they’ve never undertaken a job like your before, this could be a warning sign. Good contractors will ever over promise and under deliver; they will give an honest estimate if they can and will explain why they can’t be more exact.
- What details do you need from me?
A professional contractor who wants to do a good job will need plenty of details from you to give an accurate quote and predicted timeline for the project. Contractors who need to be prompted with this question when they start suggesting figures and timelines should be assessed with suspicion – they could be pulling these out of thin air.
- What kind of building permissions will I need for this project?
This is a great question, if you’re clueless about this then a good contractor should be able to point you in the right direction. If they offer to obtain the necessary building permissions, ask to see them to be sure, double check with the council that it has really gone through and make sure to ask if the contractor adds an additional charge for this service.
If you already know the answer to this question, then you’ll be testing their knowledge and expertise on the subject.