I'm having an electrician this morning that we found on yelp. (free) (Yelp is free, not the electrician!) I hope it works out :)

The guy was stellar! prompt, nice, good....and he didn't want to charge me.

I've used Angie's List & think its great. I've gotten excellent people and reasonable prices. Well worth the subscription.

I may subscribe. I also discovered Service Magic and the contractors there have ratings.

I have had both very good and very bad experiences with various contractors. The worst were some that were recommended by an interior decorator. One painter wanted $6,000 to paint my living room and hall! I found a wonderful guy who did the living room, hall and the entire outside of my house for $4,000. Anyone who doesn't get several bids is nuts.

Pam....I am on Service Magic.
Its how I found the cement contractor, the fence contractor, the tree service and the Pool guys.

I have since used the cement guys to do other jobs around the house.

The cement guys are also general handymen and will be doing additional work for me in the spring. Really super guys....and cute to boot LOL!!!

They are licensed in Pa and have done work in Philadelphia.
I can give you the number if you'd like.

But back to servicemagic....really good ref's!!
I would def reccomend joining!!

Cheers!
Susie

I'm a true believer in having a good (excellent) handyman that you know well for most stuff around the house. Our house sorta came with it's own handyman. He's been doing all the work at all of the houses on our penninsula for about 15 years. When we moved in our neighbor gave us his card & we've used him ever since. He's a bit of a strange duck though & not everybody could/would tolerate his quirks, I think. For instance, he won't give you any type quote except for materials & then he brings you all the receipts as soon as he purchases materials. The first job he did for us I asked, "How much?" He said, "As much as you think it's worth & don't ever ask me that question again."

He just finished residing our entire house & repainting the trim in October. Also had new gutters installed. We had horizontal cedar siding & I've always wanted cedar Nantucket-style shingles. Since builing costs are lower now & the house needed at the minimum painting we decided to get some quotes. We ran those quotes by our handyman & he said, "You wouldn't have to pay me as much. You'll still need to get somebody else to do the gutters." So, he got the job.

Anyway, he did it all with one helper. Our handyman HATES to paint. His helper was his neighbor who happens to be an artist, a portrait artist, working mostly with athletes. So, our paint job on the trim is VERY good. :) They found & corrected some rot using materials he had just laying around & said not to bother paying him for them 'cause they were in his way at home anyway.

What's really odd is that he's a nuclear submarine training simulator designer/engineer in his real life. He just does handyman work 'cause he likes construction. So, we have to be patient & let him work on his schedule, not always ours.

Anyway, if you can, find a really good handyman & then you've always got somebody to call when something bad happens at 2:00 a.m. Saturday night.

Here's the guy that painted our trim.

/tricia

Here is a link that might be useful: Portraits by Dennis

I think it depends on the area where you live. Angie's List was offered a year here for free a few years ago so I joined. In my area there were few to none of the contractors I looked up. If I were you I would want a free test for a while before paying $39.

My inlaws just had an ended-up-good experience with ServiceMagic. They had put money down months ago for a residing project scheduled to begin end of October. Well end of October came and they never heard from the contractor. For a week they called daily, no response. Finally they called ServiceMagic to complain. They were assured that short of a tornado, they'd have the contractor there in the morning. That night, sometime between midnight and 5am scaffolding and some materials were delivered. They didn't actually start work that morning, but were on full force the next. They ended up very happy with the work. It would have been nice not to have issues, but clearly ServiceMagic had the pull to make it right.

I've used it a lot and found it to be very helpful. I used to get referrals from people I knew and I found that I'm better off with someone who has multiple favorable reviews.

I finally joined thanks to Caliloo. Alex got a "promo code" from them and shared it with me. Using that I was able to join for $23. Yay. I found a couple good insulation companies through it and was able to weed out a few that don't provide the service I want (batts, not blown in). Behold the power of the CF!!

Yay Pam!

I hope it works out well for you.... good luck!

A