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This is my first time exprience this as an homeowner. My house sustained damage from the hailstorm.
What is the practice? I've had a few contracters come out, survey, and want me to sign a piece of paper authorizing them to perform work on my house and they would work w/ my insurance company.
I'm aprehensive of choosing one of these "general" contractors. My best interaction has been with the smaller guys. I met w/ a roofer guy today that was just wonderful. A referral. Owner of the company. No sales rep. He's gotten excellent reviews on Angies List. What's the best option? If you can share your experiences.
I think your first stop would be your insurance company, to have an adjuster come out before you start getting estimates. We're trying to buy a house right now & it, too, sustained some hail damage to the roof. Good luck!
We call our insurance agent first and have the adjuster come out and do an inspection. That way we know how much money we have to work with before we start talking to roofers. This last time we also asked our insurance agent to recommend a roofer (the owner of our previous roofing company had passed away). It turned out so well that in 2010 when my mom needed a new roof we called them again. Mom's insurance company also knew this roofer and they arranged to meet and inspect her roof at the same time, lol. What a breeze that was. I would feel comfortable using a roofer that got good reviews on Angie's list (as long as they were current reviews). Never use anybody that rings your door bell or puts up a sign on a telephone pole. My friends who have damage said that they can't even walk out to the mail box without getting pounced on by wannabe roofers. Oh, and never ever give them all the money before the job is finished and the new roof is inspected. Ask your insurance agent questions, that's what they are there for. (Not sure why you would be talking to a general contractor, most people just need a good roofing company).
I have a great contractor, they built our house in 2002 and still service it like a new house (they are a small builder) he is always trying to do this for us for free, like the house is his baby.
I dont think i am allowed to post his info, but if you message me, I will refer him to you.
This is my first time exprience this as an homeowner. My house sustained damage from the hailstorm.
What is the practice? I've had a few contracters come out, survey, and want me to sign a piece of paper authorizing them to perform work on my house and they would work w/ my insurance company.
I'm aprehensive of choosing one of these "general" contractors. My best interaction has been with the smaller guys. I met w/ a roofer guy today that was just wonderful. A referral. Owner of the company. No sales rep. He's gotten excellent reviews on Angies List. What's the best option? If you can share your experiences.
The GC will perform any work they are qualified to do and sub-contract the work they are not capable of doing. The GC typically has a small mark-up in price over what any sub-contractor is charging. However if you have sustained damage to your home that involves multiple tradespeople the benefit of using a General Contractor (GC) is that you only have one person to deal directly with. If it is a good GC, with good sub-contractor relationships, they might obtain a better price from the sub-contractor than you can. As a result their mark-up might not be higher, or much higher, than if you were to go to each sub-contractor yourself. Another advantage to using a GC with multiple trades involved is that some of one tradeperson's work might require coordinating work with another? That's the GC's job to make sure everyone does their work properly without cost overruns and problems.
Regardless of who you use for the work, a GC or going out to sub-contractors yourself, make sure they are properly registered with the City of Dallas and obtain any require permits for the work needed. I fully expect that you are requiring roof work (re-roof or repairs) as part of the damage. The City of Dallas has permit requirements for any work over $500 on roofs. You can see the City requirements on this FAQ page and see all requirements on the reference they give to the City Codes Welcome to the City of Dallas, Texas - Building Inspection. Dallas will only allow the homeowner or contractor to open permits, and the permits are also accessible online at the Dallas Building Inspection Department WEB site Welcome to the City of Dallas, Texas - Building Inspection.
Requiring permits, and registering contractors, has many reasons but one major reason is your protection from bad or fly-by-night contractors. When a City requires contractor registration they can also use that to prevent the less than honest, or bad, contractors from legally performing work in their jurisdiction. When you select a contractor for work contact the City of Dallas to make sure they are properly registered, ask at that time if the work they are quoting you will require a permit, and if the City will require that contractor to register with them to perform any of the work they quoted? You can also ask at that time if that contractor has been banned from pulling permits or working in the City. If the contractor is not registered with the City, the City requires them to register, and you want to use their services then make it a requirement they do register with Dallas. Registration is simple and cheap for any contractor.
Once you know what work is required and the contractor is properly registered with the city these are additional steps to help protect you.
Before any permit required work starts make sure that they have opened the proper permits with the City. You can check these online at the link above.
Before you sign any contract with the the chosen contractor make sure they have current an appropriate General Liability insurance to protect them if they make a mistake and cause damage to the home. You can ask for a copy of the contractors GL certificate, and their Agents contact information, so you can check this out. You should check this out to make sure the policy is still in effect, when it expires, and if the policy has already been used that might reduce the amount of coverage they have. Any good contractor will provide you the policy information and Agent contact so that you can check this. GL is not a 100% protection for his errors but without it any issues are all on you to fight if they occur. You might also want to check with The City of Dallas if they require registered contractors to maintain specific levels of GL insurance.
GL insurance might not cover injuries to them or their sub-contractors if it happens on your property. That is the purpose of Worker's Compensation insurance (WC). WC is not required for many contractors and if they sub the work out their sub-contractors might not have WC either. Unfortunately there have been plenty of cases where contractors claim injuries on your property and try to tap the homeowner insurance policy. You want to make sure that your contract with any contractor states that they will not hold you liable for any worker injuries of their people AND any sub-contractors they might use.
Make sure your contract specifies the expected start and completion dates or at least an expected start date and anticipated length of time to perform the work. Do realize that situations can change and these dates might need to be changed since there was such widespread damage and materials and workers might be delayed. However without it you have an open-ended contract you will be stuck with and your work can easily be pushed on the back burner after others who have required this of the contractor.
Your contract should be explicit to include the manufacturer of roof materials used, possibly other materials needed, etc. A very general contract can result in lower quality materials and methods used and yet you might be paying for the better materials and methods.
There are other considerations but these tend to be the biggest problems that catch homeowners off guard when these large scale damages occur. There are a lot of good contractors out there but you need to protect yourself. Good luck and let us know how it transpires.
Most roofers work with your Insurance Company but in the end you have to select someone who is reliable. First I would look locally for someone who has been in business for a while and the BBB can be worth looking at also. You might also do a google search on Company and also check out some of the references that a roofer offers.
I am using a roofer with no complaints and did my roof in 1991 with good results. Pretty sure your neighbors are also getting roofs repaired talk to them and see what they have found out or recommend.
The GC will perform any work they are qualified to do and sub-contract the work they are not capable of doing. The GC typically has a small mark-up in price over what any sub-contractor is charging. However if you have sustained damage to your home that involves multiple tradespeople the benefit of using a General Contractor (GC) is that you only have one person to deal directly with. If it is a good GC, with good sub-contractor relationships, they might obtain a better price from the sub-contractor than you can. As a result their mark-up might not be higher, or much higher, than if you were to go to each sub-contractor yourself. Another advantage to using a GC with multiple trades involved is that some of one tradeperson's work might require coordinating work with another? That's the GC's job to make sure everyone does their work properly without cost overruns and problems.
Regardless of who you use for the work, a GC or going out to sub-contractors yourself, make sure they are properly registered with the City of Dallas and obtain any require permits for the work needed. I fully expect that you are requiring roof work (re-roof or repairs) as part of the damage. The City of Dallas has permit requirements for any work over $500 on roofs. You can see the City requirements on this FAQ page and see all requirements on the reference they give to the City Codes Welcome to the City of Dallas, Texas - Building Inspection. Dallas will only allow the homeowner or contractor to open permits, and the permits are also accessible online at the Dallas Building Inspection Department WEB site Welcome to the City of Dallas, Texas - Building Inspection.
Requiring permits, and registering contractors, has many reasons but one major reason is your protection from bad or fly-by-night contractors. When a City requires contractor registration they can also use that to prevent the less than honest, or bad, contractors from legally performing work in their jurisdiction. When you select a contractor for work contact the City of Dallas to make sure they are properly registered, ask at that time if the work they are quoting you will require a permit, and if the City will require that contractor to register with them to perform any of the work they quoted? You can also ask at that time if that contractor has been banned from pulling permits or working in the City. If the contractor is not registered with the City, the City requires them to register, and you want to use their services then make it a requirement they do register with Dallas. Registration is simple and cheap for any contractor.
Once you know what work is required and the contractor is properly registered with the city these are additional steps to help protect you.
Before any permit required work starts make sure that they have opened the proper permits with the City. You can check these online at the link above.
Before you sign any contract with the the chosen contractor make sure they have current an appropriate General Liability insurance to protect them if they make a mistake and cause damage to the home. You can ask for a copy of the contractors GL certificate, and their Agents contact information, so you can check this out. You should check this out to make sure the policy is still in effect, when it expires, and if the policy has already been used that might reduce the amount of coverage they have. Any good contractor will provide you the policy information and Agent contact so that you can check this. GL is not a 100% protection for his errors but without it any issues are all on you to fight if they occur. You might also want to check with The City of Dallas if they require registered contractors to maintain specific levels of GL insurance.
GL insurance might not cover injuries to them or their sub-contractors if it happens on your property. That is the purpose of Worker's Compensation insurance (WC). WC is not required for many contractors and if they sub the work out their sub-contractors might not have WC either. Unfortunately there have been plenty of cases where contractors claim injuries on your property and try to tap the homeowner insurance policy. You want to make sure that your contract with any contractor states that they will not hold you liable for any worker injuries of their people AND any sub-contractors they might use.
Make sure your contract specifies the expected start and completion dates or at least an expected start date and anticipated length of time to perform the work. Do realize that situations can change and these dates might need to be changed since there was such widespread damage and materials and workers might be delayed. However without it you have an open-ended contract you will be stuck with and your work can easily be pushed on the back burner after others who have required this of the contractor.
Your contract should be explicit to include the manufacturer of roof materials used, possibly other materials needed, etc. A very general contract can result in lower quality materials and methods used and yet you might be paying for the better materials and methods.
There are other considerations but these tend to be the biggest problems that catch homeowners off guard when these large scale damages occur. There are a lot of good contractors out there but you need to protect yourself. Good luck and let us know how it transpires.
This is great info! I'm printing this out.
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