Video: Preparing to Meet with a Building Contractor

OAKLAND — Host, Sarah Rutan: When planning to meet with a building contractor, taking some preparatory steps will help you make the most of your discussion. Today we’re in Oakland with Diamond Certified Expert Contributor Bill Hinkamp of Rockridge Builders to learn more.

Diamond Certified Expert Contributor, Bill Hinkamp: The best way for customers to prepare for a meeting with us is to be as detailed as they possibly can be. Making a drawing – as scary as that may be – even a crude drawing on an eight and a half by eleven piece of paper showing, you know, what you’d like to do, how you might want to expand your existing space. Does it include doors and windows, cabinetry, combining two rooms into one – all those things are things that are easy to communicate with a drawing, and a lot more succinct than just, you know, walking around and – what we like to call – waiving your arms.

So, that, plus a detailed outline of all the things that you’d like to include, starting with the room name and the features that you’d like to include in that room. If there’s more than one, or if it’s a whole wing of a house. You know, what you’d like to see in each particular room. List the cabinets, finishes, towel selections if you are already seeing them, as well as pictures and photographs from things that you’ve already seen and really, really like.

Obviously every job is different, but starting with that – people used to go through magazines and clip pictures, but now you can access that information relatively easily on the internet. Houzz.com is a fantastic resource – really well organized. And, I like to encourage people to, you know, get as much of that online shopping done, you know, beforehand so that we can help them organize their job in the best way possible, and put together a budget for them much, much more quickly too.

Host, Sarah Rutan: To learn more from local, top rated companies, visit our Diamond Certified Expert Reports at experts.diamondcertified.org.