Lesson Learned
I had a funny yet expensive lesson I learned a couple weeks back. Hopefully others might be able to learn at my expense.
So we closed on a 3 family that was a short sale in Feb. 2 units were rented and the 3rd was vacant. It needed about 5K of work to get it back to par. Everything was pretty much done and as I was doing the final walk through I thought a nice fresh coat of paint in the unit would be a good finishing touch.
Now, I value my time so by no means was I going to paint it myself, especially on a weekend. So I made mistake # 1 and hired a friend of the family because they needed work and we could get the work done the next day. The best part was I was told they would do the work for cheap. Normally, I would get a professional but for such a small job and short notice I figured why not help out?
I use all the same paint for our units so I had the paint, brushes and equipment they needed. The next day the two friends of the family came over and painted the unit. They finished in about 5 hours and my wife even bought them lunch since she stopped by to show the units to potential tenants.
Now comes mistake # 2, not talking money upfront. So not only did I use non licensed, un-insured people but I heard it would be cheap, so I didn't talk money at all.
At the end of the day my wife asked what we owed them and it came to $500 dollars.....
That's 50 dollars an hour per person. I value my time but I could be persuaded to paint and get a free meal for $50 an hour.
My wife was in such shock she wrote them the check...Once I found out I was obviously a little upset and called and we talked through it. But, I learned a couple great lessons and will certainly not make that mistake again.
What other mistakes have people made like this that we might be able to learn from?
I don't understand. This doesn't seem like a very expensive lesson. Maybe I value my handyman hourly rate at around $40/hr as reasonable, so your "lesson" costed you $100 in my eyes. I still see this as a positive where you sacrificed some of your budget to support family members and they actually came through with the job. It could have been a more interesting lesson if they really didn't actually know how to paint, charged you $500, then you had to pay someone else $$$ + new paint supplies to redo everything that they had previously done. But in general, you are right that hiring family can be riskier than hiring professionals.
#2 Contractors Contributor
- Severna Park, MD
Sounds like you paid them what a painter would have charged in my area . They could have worked slower made the job 2 days and charged a thousand dollars . I have to agree with Jeff Bridges , you may have paid $ 100 extra .
Definitely doesn't seem like a horrible price. Most of the guys in my area would have been high $300s/low $400s. I definitely agree with you making a mistake by not talking price upfront. Just out of curiosity what were you expecting to pay?
@Chris K. I was figuring it would be in the 20/hour hour range since we were providing the paint and supplies. @Jeff Bridges The cost was not overall that expensive your right. I was more looking at the pay per hour. Probably should of mentioned they painted 3 bedrooms not the entire unit.
Did they do a nice paint job?
I decided to help out a couple (family members)who overcharged me and I think they were the worst painters on the planet.
I had worked them by the hour in the past doing odd jobs I could have did the paint job with a One Haired Brush in half the time they said it took.
:)
Originally posted by @Rob L.:
@Chris K. I was figuring it would be in the 20/hour hour range since we were providing the paint and supplies. @Jeff Bridges The cost was not overall that expensive your right. I was more looking at the pay per hour. Probably should of mentioned they painted 3 bedrooms not the entire unit.
I think your wife's initial reaction was VALID. Most handymen/tradesmen have some form of overhead/liability/reputation which is built into their price.
$50/hour/person to for labor alone for interior painting is ridiculous and is by no stretch of the imagination "cheap". If someone is doing me a favor by throwing me some work, supplying the materials, insurance, and free food- I am not going to charge them a rate above what an experienced tradesman would charge. They made out better than a professional painter. I can't see how anyone could argue this as marginal.
Sebastian
@Rich B.
1 haired paint brush! lol