I hope you guys got some great deals on hardwood flooring.

:)

ROFL

Dude...
don't get me started on that shit.

Or the beautiful wife and lovely children that can't figure out how to TURN OFF A MOTHER****ING LIGHT. I mean shit it's the exact opposite of what ever you did to turn it on
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Lol. Funny you would say that.

I did. I didn't get a single piece of carpet laid. Kids and the wife are hard on that shit.

Traded it all out in labor to a guy whose diesel blew up at just the right time for me
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Some times it is hard to pass up a good deal.

If you got any questions as far as repairs, or questions or general re: hardwood flooring give me a holler.

Yep, this. The economy is rebounding big time.

Awesome good to know.
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Could definitely use a raise but doubt I will ever see it. Could be worse, I am greatful for steady employment. Need to kill off some of this debt I have going and I will be doing well. The Feds need to give me back my 1200. Fiscal cliff is a scam to get my loot

Yeah - I'd say I'm affected. I used to get almost double what I currently charge to finish basements. I can't wait for things to right themselves so I can get back to better margins.

If I'm not mistaken, the recession ended two plus years ago?

And I'm financially better than I have ever been.

I am buying more weapons.

LMAO ROFL

May i ask what you do that provides quadruple growth? and also, do you have any openings?

People always neglect their teeth. God Bless 'em.

This. If I say more I will get in trouble.

I'll take the over LMAO

Serious question, what is an elusive eightrop?

Is that some kind of tricky dental procedure or what? i've been perplexing over that for longer than i care to admit.

LMAOLMAOROFLROFLLMAOROFL Wow. I think I could definitely be a top candidate for a job based on some ludicrous minority quota a company has to fill. Also can I use you as a reference and also quote you in ALL my interviews? I'll get called the day of my interviews then! Hahahahaha. Seriously though thank you Flop. May blessings be upon you and yours. :D

ROFL Have them give me a call. I'll set them straight. You as well, bruh.

Thanks. For the most part I know that something will work out, but I can't help but think about the loans I need to start paying on, not to mention other expenses that are on the way.

Wood Floor Sales, Installation, and Refinishing.

I grew my business through doing Home Shows (they suck), advertising, and area expansion,. Word of mouth is the most powerful, though. It's like a pyramid, once you do a great job for one person, they tell two, those two tell four, etc.

My internet home page has a ton of before/after photos to show customers what I am capable of.

I have made mistakes, and had a few customers that weren't happy (fairly rare), but I do whatever I can to make things right.

In other words, I do the opposite of all the things people hate about most contractors. I pick up the phone, I fix problems very quickly, etc. Eventually word got around that I actually care.

There are still sleepless nights, though. It's the curse of all business owners.

When I was starting out in I.T. I was damn glad to actually get paid $6.00 an hour to do I.T. stuff. Do your time learning. Ask questions, take on additional responsibility.

Communications with a minor in Business and Marketing

I opened up my quarterly statement and it was like holy shit :holdman:

I do business the same way, there have been times I have lost significant amounts of money to just make someone happy. But people know I care and that is why I'm busy,
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and you're there to extort thousands for a tiny,tiny,tiny,tiny piece of plastic.

I found out yesterday a roof I put on 2 years ago is experiencing problems. Homeowner had another contractor out and he recommended replacing the entire thing... naturally. I'm getting ready to lose some money myself.

I'm doing better than ever before. Obama!

That has more to do with you leaving your bedroom, bubba fett dolls, and tube socks rather than the economy.

Why didn't you just go psychology? Or Phys Ed?

My career of nineteen years is kind of taking a shit due to government involvement in health care. I started a business a couple years ago and it was a perfect niche to get into. I sell automotive specialty tools and parts and the business is growing rapidly. So I'm only doing well because I chose to have two full time jobs for a couple years. You have to want it or it won't happen.

It has been a bit rough on me. New baby, higher prices on everything, and my paycheck staying relatively around the same over the past couple of years has finally caught up. I am still paying the bills, but I have burned my savings and it's even forced me to switch departments in order to chase after money so I can get back to where I was 3 or 4 years ago.

Curious what career that is in the health care field?

I did basically a wide variance of Comm and Business. Actually very close to a business management degree as well.
There's opportunities everywhere for those degrees. Just have to start small I guess.

Luckily for me I have two things working in my favor:

1. I work in the entire Wash DC metro/ NoVA / SoMD area and there is NO recession here.

2. My company pays my entire health care, gas, and cell phone bills so that is a HUGE plus.

Not sure how a family of 4 or more can afford their gas and food with the sharp increase over the last 4 years. It's crazy

We handle customer service calls for large health insurance companies. It is becoming harder for those for the health insurance companies to outsource with all the regulations and uncertainties.

that really sucks, but IMO its just part of doing business. my hits are usually smaller than that though lol

What kind of problems? Usually with roof's you can pinpoint what's ****ed up and repair areas without replacing the whole roof. Well, you know this, but damn.

Sound's like the other contractor is slow and is looking to make himself some work.

Probably a combination of a few dynamics. But I know this one probably isn't the best roof my company has our name tied to. I decided to assemble a crew of out of work people and help the local economy when we had a hail storm blow through town. It's tough supervise properly when you're the only efficient roofer on a roof. But I think it's water-tight and should be fine until the next hail storm. Hope I won't have to replace the whole thing but if that's what I have to do, I'll just have to eat ramen for a while.

How long do you give warranties for? Because the shingle's have their own warranty, I'm telling you shit you already know but that sucks man.

huh, I hadn't looked but mine did 17.66% :toast:

Damn, I refinished a prefinished floor once because it didn't hold up worth a damn.

The company didn't stand behind their product, so I stepped up to the plate and took care of my customer.

Century Wood Floors lost a lot of business after that debacle.

Anywhere from 1-5 years. Gonna have to pull this contract to find out how I wrote it. But if we did something wrong and he's having problems we'll take care of him. I'm hoping this is gonna be something that will cost me half a day and a couple square of shingles rather than the whole thing. I was up there. I know the entire thing can't be garbage. Roofing isn't hard as long as you know which way water runs

That's true, but it doesn't mean that roofs don't suck. I ****ing hate roofs. Seriously. I'm sure you have better tools and techniques than I do, but goddamn roofs suck.

But I hope it works out for you.

at least it's a small one. we're just finishing up the last 15,000sf or so of this one...

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-C...0/Untitled.jpg

Yep I agree. I've done quite a bit of roofing in my time both residential and commercial. It all sucks lol. It was easier when everyone used Modified Bitumen for flat roofs, but now all these new ****ing products are coming out like Duro-last swimming pool type shit, Metal shingles etc.
Hope it works out for ya man.

Yep, come backs or just taking care of things that you really shouldn't have to, but choose to do to make the customer happy. But, you know as well as I that every auto repair or transmission repair facility makes millions and we charge way too much for something they saw on Youtube isn't really that hard.

Heh. I'll pass.

Appreciate the well wishes from you guys. This problem roof was the last roof I attempted with a hodgepodge crew. After that one, I went out and found an awesome crew who does it cheaper, faster, and better than me and my out-of-work neighbors. They've done 30-40 roofs for me and I haven't had a single issue. I think I'm going to keep them. Sometimes I'm too nice for my own good.

I saw a sign in a mechanics shop that made me chuckle, and I thought it applied pretty well. It was a cartoon of an irate customer screaming about a $150 bill for a part that cost $30. The mechanic behind the counter said "Yes sir, that part was $30. I charged you $120 for the time it took to install it, and the knowledge it required to do it correctly". I thought it was pretty good. I can't work on cars for shit.

If you're honest, I'm happy to pay you. If I lived closer, I would be at Jason's shop for everything my BIL couldn't handle. Luckily, I've got a guy in town that's semi retired and only charges $45 an hour for labor and is an honest fellow. He always calls and tells me other stuff I could get replaced while he's down there that is starting to go bad and will only take a few minutes since he's already there. If I want too, cool. If not, he moves on. God bless honest mechanics.

You really are. But God bless you for trying.

I really need to stop putting everybody else above my own family's needs though. No more favors for little old ladies. No loaning tools to my friends so they can do a job they should be paying me for. No carrying hard-luck laborers for months longer than No they deserve. No more charging $50 for something that ends up taking half a day through no fault of my own. I have to become more diligent in the bottom line because that's how a business survives. I think it's possible to be fair to my clients and make a good living too.

Wise words. I've been putting a bunch of work into my financials. Next year is going to be a challenge. That's for sure.

this about sums me up too.
every year i say im going to get tougher about it


but i never do

Before the housing bubble burst I was bringing in a minimum of $1500.00 per week. Thats working from 7 am to 2:30 pm. Optional Fridays were common due to being able to hit projected numbers on Thursday morning and working that afternoon to carry over receipts into the next week.
I now work in a field that is hit pretty heavily by the economy because its a luxury hobby, not a necessity. I make less than $600 per week now. My wife had to start working, and though I was a super for a multi-million dollar small business I now had to resort to turning my former hobby into a job.
The economy sucks and until construction comes back relatively close to half of what it was this country will continue to struggle.

Ask investors...we're trending toward the first bull market in a long time. Will be nice.

We're working our asses off, but we're doing okay.

I got board certified, which added 5k a year to my salary. I also took a promotion which added 20 contract days, extended hours, more duties and another 5k a year or so.

That was fortunate and gave us some padding because in the meantime my wife's employing company changed owners, leaving her at an impasse. She ended up striking out on her own, opening a business, and continuing to do freelance work. While we're actually pretty tight right now due to some initial issues with the business, it's looking like it's going to be profitable. I tend toward financial pessimism on a personal level, but I'm feeling pretty optimistic right now about our potential earning in coming years. We just have to get the business in the clear over the next few months, and things should be okay.

The main problem, currently, is that I work probably 10 hours a day and serve as Mr. Mom while my wife is working around 12-14 hour days, 6 days a week, starting her own business and billing 20 hours of freelance design work a week. It puts a lot of immediate pressure on the family, but we hope we'll be better for it in the long run.

More power too you, I have found the disconnect between career and life to be a gray area to some. I have been working 55-65 hours a week for the past 6 or so years. I still currently am in school full time as well, I have found that these types of time constrictions are detrimental to what is truly most important in my life. I have cut my school hours back from 17 to 12 and it has helped a lot. Money, careers and school are always there to go back to, time with family, spouse and kids if you have them is not.

It's definitely a tough juggling act. We hope that hard work for the next two years will pay off with increased time with family in the long run. I get extended time off in the summer. If my wife gets her store and design work at the proper level, she can be mobile in the summer. This will allow us to experience extended travel with the kids in the summer months.

I agree. You have to draw a line between being a steward of your community, and feeding your family. It's not criticism. You opened the can, and I'm throwing my two cents in. This is nowhere near some holier than thou rant. You're a greater guy than I am.

Yea it's good to help friends. It always comes back to ya. Something that would have cost me a few grand ended up costing me little to nothing because my friend remembered the work i did for him.

You can't do that for everybody though.

We (My family, of myself, wife and two son's) are lucky.

I have had a very stable job the past 12 years at the same business with great Union pay and benefits. (Haven't been out of work since the 80's.) My wife has been with the same company for 14 years. She can't complain as far as pay and she is on all my benefits.

We haven't gotten ourselves in trouble in the housing market.
And we aren't in a mound of debt. We cut up all our Credit Cards in March of 2003 and just use cash.

Same here. This applies to me too, word for word.

Worst part for me is my house is worth the same today as what it sold for as a new house in 1998.

That's where I sometimes get screwed the hardest. I don't do that unless I already have that type of relationship established. It's all about give and take but most people are perfectly happy to take.

I've done work cheap for Doomy from here. He also refers me to his colleagues and clients. I landed a nice project last fall from his referral and ended up getting him a $300k listing.

I wouldn't take it that way.
That's very kind but not true.

Yes, when one owns a business some people believe that they should always get a sweet deal. I've learned that many people believe all business owners are millionaires. That's part of the business that I don't enjoy. Very few real friends.