How long should this take? - Contractor Talk - Professional Construction and Remodeling Forum

smellslike$tome · 05-31-2008, 02:34 PM

I'm scratching my head about what I was charged and before anyone bows up in a knot I'm thinking it was not enough. I don't know if we were just cut some slack by a friend or if we just got the slowest guy he has or what.

We did'nt take any quotes other than his because we have known him for quite a while and he has done work for us before. He seems to vary the number of crews he has and right now I think he's got about 5 guys working for him. Yesterday, 2 guys showed up in the morning. After everything was set up, one of the guys left and we haven't seen him since. The guy that has done the painting has about 17 hours over 2 days in the job right now and I think he is basically done, just picking everything up. This didn't seem like anything special to me but I'm not a painter so I don't know. There were 2 rooms: the first is a 12' x 14' bedroom with 8' popcorn ceiling and the second is a 5' x 5' 6" (painted wall area) with 5' 6" x 7' 9" ceiling.

Here is his estimate:

Bathroom:

ceiling $30.00
walls $160.00
trim $60.00

Bedroom:

ceiling $75.00
walls $150.00
trim $75.00 (this included 2 windows and 2 slatted doors)

materials $120.00 (Benjamin Moore paint, is it any good?)

Total $670.00

Now I don't know and I did'nt ask but does he just really, really, like us or is his painter just the slowest painter on the planet or is this just fairly typical of what painters charge?

P.S. I just went back and looked at everything and I don't think he is done (maybe another hour or so but I'm really just guessing).

rbsremodeling · 05-31-2008, 02:39 PM

I would have charge more.

But If the job looks good and your satisfied with the work, I think you got a good deal. The hours don't sound to bad either for a quality job.

dincao · 05-31-2008, 04:22 PM

He is really not slow if you fiqure a 1 man show should be able to paint the ceilings, and maybe 1 coat on walls in a day, then finish walls and start the trim on the 2nd day ,and finish all the trim, doors and windows on the 3rd day. He really gave you a bargin, i would tell him thankyou you did me a big favor, because i would have charged $1,300.00 for the job....

smellslike$tome · 05-31-2008, 05:10 PM

I felt like it was a little light after seeing how long it took but I didn't know if maybe it shouldn't have taken that long. In any event he is done and the work looks good to my untrained eye and best of all I didn't have to do it

. I never negotiated (I never negotiate anyway, either I can afford you or I can't) with him, in fact I just let my wife handle it. Like I said, he's done work for us before and we were happy with that so we just call him when we need painting done. I hate to paint and I suck at it too. After reading your posts it seemed he wasn't really slow after all (what do I know) so I wrote a check for $670.00 and gave the painter $100 cash tip. I'm satisfied. Maybe I'll send the owner a gift certificate to the steak house or something. One thing is for sure, you'd never get a plumber to give you two days for that price, not even the ones still stuck in 1975 charging $75 per hour

.

Sir Mixalot · 05-31-2008, 06:49 PM

I think you should have given the owner the $100.00 dollar cash tip , and the painter the steak house gift certificate.

thom · 05-31-2008, 09:44 PM

You're accustomed to billing for plumbers. Painters bill out at half (or less) of what plumbers bill out for.

smellslike$tome · 06-01-2008, 12:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sir Mixalot

I think you should have given the owner the $100.00 dollar cash tip , and the painter the steak house gift certificate.

Well I'm counting on the owner knowing what he should charge. If he needed more money then it was his job to know that and charge it. The guy that did the painting works for a certain wage I presume. He was the one who did the work, he gets the tip. If the owner had been there they probably would have split the tip. My barber is part owner in his shop. Every time he finishes cutting my hair I ask him how much it is now and everytime he says $15. I always say "Thanks, Charlie" and hand him a $20 bill. Now he owns the joint but I tip him anyway because when he's cutting my hair he's not wearing his owners hat he's wearing his barbers hat. Occasionally I will receive a tip from a customer. Usually people do not know that I am the owner because I don't tell them unless they ask. So they are tipping a plumbing technician who did good work in solving their problem. I never tell them "oh that's ok, I'm the owner, you don't have to tip me". They do it because they want to not because they have to and I've never had a customer hand me extra money and say "this is a tip for the owner of the company. Would you make sure he gets it?"

So the painter gets the tip and the owner gets the steak dinner to show my gratitude for him sending me a competent workman who got the job done neither of which I am obligated to do but choose to do because I want to.

Now just for the sake of discussion though let's say I chose to tip the painter $1000 and the owner got no steak dinner. Does the owner have any right to complain? No of course not. He gave his price and I paid it without fuss or complaint. What I do with the rest of my money is my business and he should be happy that he got paid in full, when the work was completed and without having to chase me for it.

Frankawitz · 06-01-2008, 10:20 AM

I would figure he charged like this painter $8.00 an hour $136.00 paint $160.00 = $295.00 Owner $375.00 sounds about right to me.

ewingpainting · 06-01-2008, 09:09 PM

I would agree it seem a little slow, sounds like bad supervision. maybe you should tell your friend. I know I would want some feed back from my customer's of how my guys are preforming good or bad. If he is professional about it he will appreciate it.

boman47k · 06-01-2008, 10:31 PM

Quote:

trim $75.00 (this included 2 windows and 2 slatted doors)

Can't beat the trim cost imo.

2 coats, right? I'd say that was a real good deal. He do any spraying?

davy crockett · 06-03-2008, 10:08 AM

Sounds fair for the whole deal to me, $1000.00 is fair for a master bed-bath combo for top end work and Ben.Moore paint is a great label but remember they also have aptartment grade paint. As for the tip that says you just won yourself some loyalty. I wish more folks realized the value of a tip no matter the quantity it's the gratitude that counts. Now you have to remember this deal as I figure he's gonna be remodeling a bath and guess who the plumber's gonna be????