I tried to find something more interesting, but this will have to do.

After getting out of that contract last year due to oil tank issue, we somehow ended up with a house in even worse condition, though it was very cheap for the area. The nice thing is that we have some money left over for upgrades. How much do costs vary from one region to another? We're in a fairly expensive part of Long Island, NY and the quotes we've been getting seem very high relative to what we've seen elsewhere or ITT. These are some of the quotes we've gotten from various contractors:

Full replacement of the siding (vinyl) including window trim and gutter: 30K
Full replacement of the windows: 15K
Replacing gas steam heating with water heating: 26K
Replacing gas steam heating with hydronic air heating and central AC (2-zone): 37K
Central AC: 13K

These appear to be reputable firms with websites and everything and we talked to salespeople who came by our house to give us estimates. Are we on the right track and talking to the right people?

Aside from heating, AC, siding, windows, here are some other things we're interested in doing over the next couple of years:

Basement
Kitchen
Bathrooms (renovate existing as well as add a new one)
Backyard (landscaping, patio, gazebo, shed etc)
New Garage

Are we better off going with a general contractor / home-builder type to manage all these as part of a coherent whole? With some of the quotes we've been getting, we were wondering if the general contractor getting better pricing on the subs would offset the cost of the GC, while also making the process smoother. It seems that we're looking at ~150K or more for all these anyhow.

On second thought, I think these add up to more like 200K+.

One thing I find particularly egregious about some of these quotes is that we're being told to arrange everything for them - all three of the heating companies asked us to arrange asbestos removal ourselves (two of them contradicting what the salesmen had originally said), two of them asked us to prepare the basement ceiling so that they can get to the pipes (which neither of the salesmen mentioned), one of them asked us to remove the existing steam pipe (again contradicting what the salesman said). I was thinking, why do I have to arrange everything myself if I'm essentially paying marked up retail price which seems to be way more than what a builder/GC would pay to just get the specific job done? If I have a GC in charge, even if I eventually pay the marked up price through the combination of contractors, at least I get the convenience of not having to arrange all these myself.

Does this make any sense?

How big is your house?

About 2000 SF, 2-story, full-ish basement.

Edit: and some usable attic too but both basement and attic are basically unfinished.

Without knowing how big your house is, but I assume it's old with plaster walls and not drywall/sheetrock?

I am in SoCal

Central AC for 13k is about right, my inlaws got a quote for a new unit and new ducting and it was $12k with permits. They have almost a 2k sq' home. Got it done for 8k, from a HVAC guy who works for a company but has his own liscence and does it on the side too. Old supervisor gave me his number, just got lucky with that one.

Windows for 15k could be about right depending on how many windows, and what brand you want, getting sliding doors too? Are the vinyl windows or wood single hung?

Like 5-6 years ago we hired a company to re-side a 1500sq' home and it was like 15-20k and that was in a ghetto part of town.

I don't know what gas steam heating is.

Do you know anyone who has had work done by a General Contractor to give any recommendations?

I doubt you get a better price on the subs from a GC, subs charge what they charge and the General just adds their 10-20%. The good thing is you don't have to coordinate all your trades bc most homeowners will totally fvvck it up.

Depending on your GC, they should be able to do a lot in house which will give you a better price, or he could do a lot on his own. Some GC do a lot in house and some just sub most everything out.

You are looking at about $150k for the items in this post depending on what you want.

2000SF, 2-story, with a decent-sized attic and nearly full-basement, both unfinished. I don't know much about the walls but the house is like 100 years old.

The windows that were shown were vinyl, nothing fancy from what I could tell. No sliding doors or anything unusual.

Steam heating system that uses gas as fuel. Obviously we're keeping the gas part so just switching from steam system to water system, which entails replacing the steam pipes.

Not in the area. It seems that the same contractors tend not to work in both NYC and Long Island due to licensing issues.

I guess the question is - are these even subcontractors or retail fronts that works with their own subcontractors and are taking their own cut the same way the general would.

So my dog has been sprayed by a skunk twice in the last month (first 2 times it has ever happened) so I want to put some motion sensor floodlights in the yard so at least I know if something is out there before sending him out at night. I just live in a subdivision and the yard isn't very big, but I can't see all of it from the patio door. Was thinking of installing a couple solar powered lights like this on top of the fence: https://www.wayfair.ca/Sunforce-Sola...ource=hotdeals

Thoughts? Better recommendations? Would be quite difficult/expensive to hardwire something where I need it. Are the battery powered ones better? They usually run on 3-4 D batteries.

IME most of the guys that are doing specific tasks IE roofing/siding/windows etc mostly have their own crews that do the work. Its easy enough to ask them if all of their work is done by in house employees if thats a concern of yours.

WRT hiring a GC, its just a matter of taste. If it was me and I was doing that much work I would insta hire a GC just because of the hassles and headaches I would avoid. Also I feel like you will get a higher standard of work done if you hire a good GC and outline specifically to them what you expect. Also contractors are much more reticent to burn bridges with a GC than they are a homeowner.

I recently found this thread and its pretty cool. I'm significantly downgrading home size and quality and looking to fix up my new place so I may be posting here some more. I'm also a contractor with a very niche business that knows almost nothing about actually building stuff.

Goose,

We had motion-detector floodlights for a while, but now keep them off because too many things trigger them. The worst was leaves blowing if the wind kicks up. But that was several years back, so maybe newer ones are better?

Hoagie, what's your niche?

I work in Masonry restoration. Mainly staining masonry/concrete but some cleaning as well.

Put the solar motion lights in last year and they are great. The panel even sat under the snow for 3 weeks and the light still turned on.

All motion lights will be sensitive to movement, but the one I have can be adjusted to different ranges so that it doesn't get too annoying.

link to the one you have?

These are great points. The main reason why we've been hesitant is that 1) we are looking to move in soon and 2) want to spread out some of these over the next two years or so at our discretion especially since we have little kids. I'm assuming that if we hire a GC, we may lose control over when and how things are done and the house may not be livable for long stretches of time.

The GC isn't a dictator. Projects will happen per your schedule. But there may be cases where a week or two of inconvenience will save you $$$, and a good GC will tell you why you should do X Y and Z at the same time instead of trying to do it piecemeal.

I've seen a lot of people cost themselves a ton of money and get bad results because they simply don't know how to properly sequence and coordinate home improvements.

That's good to hear. I guess the other concern is we're not sure how much we want to commit ourselves to in the short/medium term.

Yes that's where we're headed and this has been something that's been bothering us. These are some sequencing issues we've already been thinking about:

If we do the siding, then later replace AC units on the wall with central AC, that creates a bunch of extra work to cover the wall, redo the siding and/or lead to potentially awkward appearance.

If we do the siding, then later add attached garage, we will have wasted $$$ on doing the siding on the side of the house that will be extended to make room for garage.

If we do the windows and/or the siding, then later redo the kitchen, it's possible some of those windows may need to be moved and the siding redone where there were windows.

If we do the basement, then do the heating, we may have to rip out a lot of the finish, especially the ceiling.

If we replace the gutter, it probably has to be reinstalled after replacing the siding.

Fencing has to wait until we know exactly where the garage is going to be.

Landscaping has to wait until we know exactly where the garage is going to be.

i'm not able to completely respond to your entire question right now, but in regards to the bolded above: please, please, PLEASE don't install vinyl siding on your house.

understanding i'll probably sound like an environmental wackadoo munching on granola, the production of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) prematurely kills the people that make it. this is not a rumor, this is not a myth. buying vinyl siding is pretty much guaranteed to shorten the lifespan of multiple people.

i highly recommend watching the documentary 'Blue Vinyl'. here's a link to the trailer

http://www.docurama.com/docurama/blue-vinyl/

there are other options...please explore them.

Coming from a fella that posts in all kinds of football threads that seems a bit hypocritical.

Edit: that comes off as churlish but that was not my intent.

The same can be said for buying an iPhone, using electricity that was made by coal, or buying your girl a diamond. It's just a hard world to navigate.

What are the other options - we've talked to two contractors and we were given no other options so far. Also is this limited to vinyl among construction materials? We've already been blindly buying lots of things as needed and it seems they can't all be good for the environment or the people making or working with them.

I'm content to hate vinyl siding for purely aesthetic reasons. Never really looked into the health aspects of it. But given that most people dgaf and just want to slap something on the side of their house to keep the weather out, it's hard to beat from a cost/performance standpoint.

So the city decided to re-do the sidewalks and roads in front of my house. The contractor poured the concrete today, and this is what they did:



This isn't acceptable, right? The old sidewalk from the curve to the corner was a dead straight line. There's no reason for it to be drunkenly wandering all over the place.

I've left a message with the city for them to get back to me and/or come and inspect the work. My wife thinks I'm overreacting, but I want it ripped up and re-done.

Here's my email to the city:

"I am looking to contact someone in charge of the (My Street Name) construction that is being undertaken by (Contractor Name).

My wife and I own the house at (My Address), and the sidewalks poured along the stretch in front of our house are unacceptable.
I have taken pictures, but am unsure of how to attach them here, but if you send someone to look at how crooked
(the "straight" stretch, I understand that the sidewalk is meant to curve north of us) the sidewalk here is, you'll understand the issue.

I'm a ticketed carpenter that has specialized in concrete for the last 25 years, so if (Contractor Name) need, I could lend them
a string line for when they replace this mess.

Thanks,
(My Name)"

Everyone here freaks out about this, right?