She Thought Building A Deck Was Too Hard To Do Herself, Until A Contractor’s Quote Changed Her Mind
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Imagine deciding you want to do a home renovation project, but you think it’s too hard to DIY. If you had contractors come out to give you quotes for the job, would you pick the best one and hire them, or would you take what you learned from them to equip yourself to DIY the job after all?
In this story, a first-time homeowner wants to add a deck to her house. She’s not sure how to do it, so she had a bunch of contractors give her quotes. After talking to one of them, she changed her mind about hiring a contractor and thinks she can do the job herself.
Her boyfriend thinks she’s being shady. Is she?
Let’s read the whole story to decide.
AITA for calling out a contractor for a free estimate then using his plan without hiring him?
I bought my 1st house ever several months ago. It’s a light fixer-upper and boyfriend has been helping me with the projects.
I’ve always wanted a deck since I’ve always lived in apartments and to me, a deck makes the statement that I’ve arrived.
However, neither my boyfriend and I know the first thing about building decks.
We tried watching YT videos and even bought a book about decks but it seemed way too hard.
She knew they couldn’t do it themselves.
I decided to hire someone to build it and called several contractors.
Most were too busy to take on another project this year and others could do it but they said it’ll be at least a month before they could start the project.
I decided that was fine so I told those guys they could come out give me their quotes.
Some came out while i was at work and left their quotes on my door. Others took a look around and handed me their quotes without saying much.
One contractor was extra helpful.
One guy was super nice and walked around my yard with me. He answered any questions I had and I had a bunch.
I asked him if I could record our walk and he said sure.
He was very thorough with his answers about the materials, locations of footings and piers, how deep he’ll place them, things like that.
He gave me his quote then left.
She got an idea.
That night I watched the vid and decided the job wasn’t that hard. He was so thorough it was like watching a how-to video.
The next day when my boyfriend came over, I excitedly told him we could build the deck ourselves and save a bunch of money.
He was hesitant until I showed him my vid.
Her boyfriend is not on her side.
Instead of being supportive, he got extremely mad. He said it was shady what I was planning to do.
I argued it’s no different than YT vids but he argues that it is.
We argued for a bit until I told him he was being ridiculous. We argued all night until he said he’s going to bed.
I still don’t see how I’m wrong since there’s no contract and I’m under no legal obligation to hire anyone. Besides, those contractors freely came out to look at my place and give me quotes. No one made them do it.
The difference is that it’s not a YouTube video. The contractor told her how he would do the project. He was not trying to tell her how to do the project herself.
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Let’s see how Reddit responded.
This person urges her not to take advantage of the awesome contractor.
Another person explains why this is different than a YouTube video.
A contractor weighs in.
Everyone agrees with her boyfriend.
As a homeowner, I can say that it’s really, really hard to find a good contractor. If she has in fact found a great contractor, she should hire him. There may be other home renovation projects she wants to do down the road, and it’s very helpful to have a contractor you can call who will get the job done.
Her boyfriend is right. She needs to do the right thing.
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