General Contracting is not for the faint of heart

Let me start this article by saying that I don’t know if being your own contractor is really a good idea. After doing it myself, I now understand the value of hiring a good, experienced general contractor. However, that’s the catch, you need to find a good, experienced general contractor. One that understands your wants and needs, but also understands your decision making style and criteria for success.

We didn’t find that and have been extremely lucky to find accomplished subcontractors. What could have been a disaster, turned into a beautiful functioning home.

We had hired a friend – that should have been the first sign that we were doing something wrong. We hired a general builder and thought he was a general contractor. There is a big difference. A general handyman/builder, does that, he builds – usually studs for walls, maybe basic plastering and drywall, maybe hanging doors – he is not a finishing carpenter and he is not a general contractor. To assume so, is a quick path to disaster.

Just this simple misunderstanding of the terms of the trade shows you why it’s difficult to recommend wholeheartedly that any homeowner act at their own contractor. But sometimes you have to get your hands dirty to understand the value of something.

We thought we had done our research. Our plan was comprehensive. The renovation was extensive, but contained. We wanted to reconfigure the interior walls on the top floor of our Victorian style townhouse to accommodate a slightly larger bathroom, walk in closets and finished study/den. We did the plans and we did them in detail. We did drawings and checked measurements. We had determined what materials we wanted, researched pricing and purchased all the main items up front. We knew we wanted high end finishes, and realized that we’d have to cut costs to accommodate this desire.

We bought our tub from Home Depot homedepot.ca. Our tiles came from The Tile Shoppe tileshoppes.com. Closet organization came from Superior Closets superiorclosets.com. Beautiful Kohler faucets and hardware were purchased at a significant discount through an online store in the US faucet.com. Hint: we had to use a US postal address and pick up the products in Niagara but we save more than $1600.00 doing this. Hardwood floors are from Aurora Flooring aurorafloorings.com. Beautiful 70 mm thick Jatoba Prefinished 3” floors for just under $5.50/square foot installed. The amazing vanity with full ceiling height tower came from Home Again Inc.homeagaininc.com as did the side panel window insert and the closet doors. The marble for the vanity top and tub surround were from Sinco Granite and Marble sincogranite.com. All of these suppliers provided both superior products and service. I would highly recommend each of them.

But we quickly learned this was only the beginning. We’d ask for an estimate of materials costs from several different sources. A rough figure of $500 was the average. In reality, that was the average for getting the drywall delivered to the job site on the 3rd floor. Once the old walls came down, then the real costs start adding up. When the demolition was finished, the real work begins.

We had contracted for the builder to begin construction of the new interior walls during a time we would be out of the house (and out of the country). We were gone for two weeks and this, everyone agreed, should be long enough to put up the new studs and get the basic drywall up for the closets.

Ah, the best laid plans of mice and men. If you’re out of the house, that is good. If you’re out of the country, that is bad. Since we were not on site, we couldn’t answer questions as they came up. Work stops. Instead of a house with the construction at the point where subcontractors could come in to do tiling, or plumbing, or electrical, basic studs had not been put in place. And once you have a messed up timeline, then you don’t have a builder, because he has other commitments as well.

At this point, my husband and I had to take over. With no prior experience and HGTV and DIY TV (thank God they were doing a program sampling at the time) as our teachers, we began cutting and hanging drywall. We quickly figured out that taping, mudding and painting were not our forte and used the services of Pride Custom Painters 416-418-5433. We hired electrical help from JTL and Sons at 647.505.3197. The plumbing was done by Plumbing Getting You Back on Tap 647.889.7585. But we did the lifting and cutting and screwing and hammering. We figured out how to build a tub deck. But mostly we were lucky. We had amazing subcontractors that really knew their trades.

Planning and getting subs in a timely manner is an art form in itself. In the competitive Toronto market, finding good trades people that are not fully booked for the next six months is even tougher. Look for licenses. It’s important, especially for electrical and plumbing. We never did find a finishing carpenter. We wound up putting up trim and caulking edges. The end result is stunning, but would we do it again… give me a few more months to forget the pain before I answer that one.

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