| To protect yourself you must do the following:
1. Insist that your contractor get a permit. Only licensed contractors will
be able to purchase a permit.
2. Do not pay any money up front. The State of California limits contractor
to a maximum down payment of $1000.00 or 10% (except pool contractors which max
out at $200), whichever is least. If your contractor requests a down payment
that exceeds this amount-tell them to move on. They are either ignorant or are
deliberately breaking the law-at your disadvantage. If the contractor doesn't
have enough funds in his bank to cover the expenses of your job...what kind of
contractor are they? They certainly are not very successful. Wouldn't rather
have your work performed by a successful contractor.
3. It is customary to retain 10% until final city inspection or 30 days,
whichever comes first. Your ability to withhold this last bit of money will help
to ensure that the contractor performs his duties. Most of the time that last
10% is the profit from the job. That contractor will make those last minor
repairs to bring your purchase up to code to receive that profit.
4. Never pay cash. If the contractor says that they will give you a discount
for cash-tell them to move on. Credit cards cost contractors between 2 and 3
percent of the sale. If your contractor gives you a "Cash" discount of 10%, they
are losing money. They are either hiding the money from Uncle Sam, Child
Support, the State or lawsuits. Having a record trail of funds is a good way of
keeping track of your expenses and it is a good way to find out where the money
went in the event your contractor fails to make good on any needed repairs.
5. Check out your contractor with the State Contractor License Board at
www.cslb.ca.gov. Make sure they are
licensed.
6. If your contractor has employees--make sure they have Workers Compensation
Insurance. You can check this out at
www.cslb.ca.gov. If any employee gets hurt on your property without the
employer having workers compensation insurance you can be held responsible for
the medical bills. (This is no joke. Doctors regularly hike the price of service
way up in workers compensation cases. A simple office visit has cost me over
$1000.00, I had to forward the bill to my Compensation carrier. The employee saw
the doctor for less than 15 minutes and received Tylenol 3, single dose". This
is not uncommon as this has happened to me 3 times in the last 10 ten years.
Because of the different types of work that we do I have separated the photos
out into the following sections:
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