I suck at hiring people, and at managing them.
The last couple of weeks have confirmed this, because we’re getting our apartment ready to sell, and that involves hiring people to do things. Which I’ve done, to sucky effect.
1. The bathroom guys.
First, we had to re-grout the bathroom tiles and re-glaze the tub. I asked a few trusted friends for recommendations. No one had one. Even a contractor I asked said, “I don’t know anyone who grouts. That’s something you can do yourself.”
Are you kidding? Me, grout the bathroom?
I don’t even know how to clean the bathroom. To shine up the sink, I use soggy toilet paper or an Olay face wipe (after I’ve already used it to remove my makeup, because they’re expensive). And if it’s that easy, why don’t you just take my money and do it for me?
I looked up “reglazing and regrouting NYC” on google. The first company that came up had a decent website featuring before-and-after pics. Ooooh.
I am a sucker for before-and-after.
Transformed bathrooms aren’t as much fun to look at as liposuction and chin jobs, but the photos were still gratifying and made me want to hire these people.
So did the fact that they were at the top of google, which was, by my knucklehead logic, absolute proof that they would do good work with bathroom tile.
I asked in an email how much dust they’d kick up, and how I should protect our stuff. The guy wrote back:
“You don’t have to prepare the apt. Just sit back and relax. There may be a slight odor but no dust.”
Sold! I wouldn’t even have to leave the apartment. I can handle slight odor. I have a bad sense of smell.
Cut to grouting day.
After the two guys had been chipping away in the bathroom for a few hours, I looked up from my laptop and noticed that I was surrounded by fog. I ran my finger along the glass surface of my desk, and, sure enough, came up with a fingerfull of dust. (Fingerfull, by the way, is not a real word. How dumb! What measurement are you supposed to use for frosting that you eat straight from the can?)
I interrupted them and said, “Uh, excuse me, but I think the apartment is full of dust. You said there wouldn’t be any.”
One of them stood up and came out to look.
“Huh. That doesn’t usually happen. But we normally work in windowed bathrooms.”
I heard the other one call out, his voice echoing from the bathroom, “You told her there wouldn’t be any dust??”
They hadn’t even bothered to close the doors around them. Or warned me to.
The fog and dust were everywhere.
The living room, the bedroom, the bedding, the tote bag hanging on the doorknob, the bowl of tomatoes and remaining half-banana in the kitchen. All of it, covered in a fine, clingy film.
As if it wasn’t too late, I asked them to seal off the bathroom area with plastic. While they went — sulkily, I might add — to the hardware store to buy some, I googled “grout dust”, “grout debris”, and, since I’d been sitting there the whole time, “grout lung”. I found results for all of them. And, a thing called “grout haze”.
When the guys came back, I asked them why they hadn’t mentioned any of that, and why they had a gas mask in their pile of stuff.
“Oh, grout haze comes later in the process. And the mask is for the fumes when we reglaze.”
So much for the “slight” odor. And why just one mask?
“We take turns with it.”
They take turns not breathing poison? Do I get a turn?
“Also, you know, grout is really just stone. So what you’re breathing out there is all natural.”
Sweet. So is rattlesnake venom. And black mold.
Steven and I (mostly Steven) spent the next three days vacuuming up this all-natural toxin dust, and the next two weeks coughing. Can you say “grout lung”?
I won’t even comment on the quality of the work.
2. The painter.
I felt good about this choice, because my friend and broker Lisa had recommended him. “He’s fine,” she said of the painter we’ll call “Jean Paul”. “He’s exactly what you need.” She’s referred Jean Paul to lots of clients, and used him herself, all with happy results.
He quoted me a dirt-cheap price to paint the whole apartment. A you-get-what-you-pay-for price. Great. All we wanted to get, and pay for, was a well-applied coat of paint to brighten the place and inspire record-setting bidding wars.
I asked, “You bring the drop cloths and cover all the furniture, right?”
“Yes, Laura,” he said on the phone, using my name in every sentence. “Laura. I do all of this. You don’t need to do anything, Laura.”
Where had I heard that before?
Jean Paul showed up wearing a neat-fitting, Versace denim suit and carrying one smallish duffle bag with everything, including his painting outfit, in it. As he unpacked, I kept waiting for the drop cloths to come out. They didn’t. I asked about that.
“Laura. I won’t need drop cloths. There will be no paint on anything.”
I took his word for it.
I went in to check on things after an hour or so, and saw that he’d placed the goopy paint-can lid upside down on our dresser. We like this dresser.
“Um, Jean Paul? I’m a little worried about paint getting on the furniture. You’ve got the paint lid right on top of it.”
“Laura. No paint will get on the furniture.”
He said it so confidently that I felt crazy questioning him. So I left the room.
When he moved on to a wall that has a drawer fastened to it, I asked, “You’re going to tape off that drawer, right?”
I know this isn’t a crazy thing to ask. Masking tape is a normal thing for painters to use, which is why it’s often labeled “painter’s tape”.
“Laura. Don’t worry.”
In other words, no to the tape. Jean Paul painted around the drawer with sure-handed, steady strokes, barely looking. As though he was a “not getting paint on stuff” black belt. But I don’t care how good you are — can’t you just humor me and put down some tape?
It was like when a waiter takes the order at a table of ten people and won’t write it down, no matter how many times you ask, “are you sure you’ll remember all this?”
I waited till Jean Paul had moved on to another area to go over and inspect his work, because I felt like a Neurotic Nelly checking up on him.
But there it was, a line of paint slopping over onto the edge of the drawer.
“Oh, no!” I yelled, after thinking about what to yell. He looked up.
“This is why I suggested masking tape. There’s paint on the drawer.”
Jean Paul laughed and shook his head. “Laura. This is not a big deal. The paint is water based.”
To show me how easy the paint was to remove, he attacked it with a phillips screwdriver, which I knew would scratch the lacquer. I stopped him and said I’d pick it off myself with something less sharp. Like an ice pick.
Same deal with the front door. “Jean Paul, you positive you don’t want some tape?”
“Laura. I do not need tape.”
He gladly corrected the bubbles and drips I pointed out around the house (“Laura. Semi-gloss drips more than flat paint.”)
But then, after he left on the last day with his Versace denim pocket full of cash, I realized there was a wavy line of white paint wrapping around inside edge of the door, which is otherwise mauve. I tried picking it off with my fingernail, but it stripped off the mauve paint, too, revealing the original dark green.
I’m not sorry I hired Jean Paul. Remember, he was dirt cheap. And it all came out fine. But I should have said, “Jean Paul. Use the damn tape.”
Next up: renovations on the new place.
I think I’ll have Steven hire the contractors.
Talk to me. Do you hire good people? Do you work well with them? Or do you suck like me?
Tell me your household hiring triumphs, or nightmares, in the comments.
I’m curious to find out what blog platform you have
been working with? I’m experiencing some minor security problems with my latest website and I would like to find something more risk-free.
Do you have any recommendations?
OMG. This is hysteri-balls! I used to be a maid. I used to clean green…but I had one bathroom that had grout and a tub so funky I had to marinade that badboy with bleach. Luckily, my husband was working with me that day, we used to team up for real estate move-outs, yada,yad,yada…anywho, I passed the hell out from the fumes…I woke up with my husband near tears…while copping a feel on my boobs…because the bleach had eaten a hole through my shirt and my bra… Lesson: Grout ain’t my friend…and my husband would totally do with dead me if I died of bleach poison. For the record, I am an EPA certified renovator…but I can tell you up front if you hire me, I’m gonna sit on my fat ass and watch soaps all day.
Laura,
Your comments on Jean Paul were funny & exasperating. Next time, I suggest you try the assertiveness approach: you know: ‘I understand that you don’t use tape, but I want tape applied! & you can start on your mouth.’
Jean Paul? Jean Paul? Don’t you have a friend who would welcome him for a drink at her place? He would look great taped to her green wall. Sacre bleu!
Love,
Dad
Damn you autocorrect!!! “confident” not “confinement” and yes, it took 18 months instead of 10 weeks to do the kitchen!!!!
Laura – this post makes me want to laugh and cry – it hits so close to home! Having (barely) survived the renovation of our kitchen and 4 bathrooms, I am all too familiar with incompetent workmen, and with my inability to deal forcefully with them. I hate to hover and second guess, as I know nothing about what they are doing – though I feel confinement they are doing it wrong! Whit and I have come close to divorce (kidding but not really) during the course of these projects, and I have declared that I will move before I do any more work on the house. I could keep you here all day with horror stores, but I’ll just say that our kitchen was supposed to take 10 weeks and 18 months! On top of that it went 200 percent over budget. So… Sorry I’m not the one to give you tips on dealing successfully with workers!
I suppose i should just be thankful we didnt get grout lung – but then, I am married to a thoracic surgeon….Good luck with the move!
The time delay is horror story enough! And wow, FOUR bathrooms? We’re planning to renovate the bathrooms in the new place, but trying to work it out so it happens before we move in. I hope we can find someone good, who sticks to schedule.
I don’t want a divorce.
I hate that feeling of Wild West pricing. I’m pretty sure that’s a real term. Contracter: “That job will cost you $4,000” Me: “Oh, okay.” Contracter: “Oh, I’m sorry, I meant 40 dollars.” Me: “Oh, Okay.” Contracter: “Wait, just a second, I did mean $4000.” Me: “Oh, Okay.” I try to do jobs myself these days, so that when it comes out like crap — I am still proud that I did it myself. And then I find a way to spend the 4,000 I saved.
I’ve had that same conversation many times. I think that’s why so many don’t use email. They don’t want to have to stick to their arbitrary price in case they want to arbitrarily raise it.
If they do have email, it’s a crappy aol address. Like supercontractorrenovations1962@aol.com
Laura, I have the solution: You need to move to this part of NYS — the Finger Lakes. We have guys who know what they’re doing and do a great job. At anything. They actually come to your home and look at the job first, none of this “on the phone” bullcrap.
Oh wait, there was the one guy who did my roof — I nearly took him to small claims court, Twice! But that was partly my fault — I should have gotten 3 estimates, but because I was getting ready to go on a trip to Greece and his truck was always doing a roof in the neighborhood, I just took his estimate. I told him I needed the job done before the date I was supposed to leave, and he assured me it would be finished. The materials arrived two days before my departure. He wanted a check FOR 3/4 OF THE COST!! before I left — he came to get it at 7am on the morning I was leaving. His crew arrived — not one spoke English. It was a tear-off, so they removed the entire roof which meant the debris fell directly into my attic. He never told me to prepare and cover up my stuff.
I went to Greece for 10 days and came back. The roof was on. But my gutters were half on the ground or hanging in thin air. When I looked up inside my attic, it looked like a nuclear bomb hit it. My house is 100+ years old — lots of old wood splinters, black dust.. god it was horrible. It was all over and inside everything.
The story goes on (he ripped me off on my porch roof & skimped on the roof line nails) — but I hired a guy to do an extreme exterior makeover on my house 2 years later and he saved me by pointing out the rip-offs and being “physically present” when the ratbag (“What’s your problem?!”) had to come back and correct things. Otherwise every guy I’ve hired to do work has been excellent in every way, including painters who always used drop cloths, painter’s tape and had hands as steady as a surgeon.
And if they fail me — well, I write a hell of a letter and I’m not afraid to tell the tale.
Where are you moving?
Yeah, the Finger Lakes aren’t sounding like such a sure bet now. But I’m glad I’m not the only one who’s been ripped off. There are more incidents than I shared here, sadly.
We’re just moving down the block. Or up the block. Whichever way is east.
I didn’t hire him, but my landlord has an exterminator come in. I was convinced we had bed bugs. I was waking up with little bumps on my body every day!
This guy had an accent for DAYS. I could hardly understand a word he said to me on the phone, and in person was no better. He asked to see my bites and then laughed at me. “THAT IS NOT BED BUG BITE, THIS IS!” and then lifted up his pant leg to reveal a veritable garden of bruises and bumps. He said that bed bug bites leave a mark that never goes away. At this point, I felt like I was taking crazy pills. Especially because I had spent the 3 days prior doing NOTHING but researching bed bugs, and I’d read nothing about this! He pointed to each bite in turn and told me “United Airlines” “Delta” “Continental” “All airplanes have bed bugs” he said. WHAT?!
He said I must have dust mites and that his poisonous spray would kill them too. Similar to your “there will be no dust” – I was assured over the phone that my dogs could remain in the apartment that day. But this guy said “You need to get them out of here and they can’t come back for 6 hours.” WHAT?!
I ended up taking a cab into manhattan and stashing them at Justin’s office in an unused meeting room while I sat there on my laptop browsing the internet. All of my video work was on my desktop computer which was now surrounded by poison air. That was all easier said than done, though. My dogs both get motion sickness. So yea… the cab rides were fun!!!!
Oh and at some point, the guy told me he found a bed bug, but then went back to saying I didn’t have any. I’m still not clear on what he was exterminating that day.
Regarding exterminator’s pants: at least he pulled up, instead of down. But otherwise, WTF. What’s with the bruises? Is he confusing bedbugs with S&M love play? And why doesn’t he switch to taking the train? And how could you hire someone for bedbugs who doesn’t use Rosco the Bedbug-Sniffing Dog (AS SEEN ON TV)? Even I know that.
Your dogs barf in cars? I love you, Vargas.
Oh, my God — Your posts are some of the very few that actually make me LOL aloud! None of that fake stuff.
Well, thank you! You know I live for actual, non-fake LOLs.
Just reading that made me so angry for you. Before our alcoholic kitchen carpenter flaked out on us, he used to say to me, “don’t worry about it.” Every time I noticed a potential problem (like the refrigerator space being too small for the fridge), it was “don’t worry about it.” That’s the line they teach in the Learning Annex class for contractors: How To Make Your Client Feel Like A Neurotic Bitch. (Manicurists also take the class).
Such a funny post. Favorite moment: you waiting your turn to not inhale poison.
Thank you for your anger, sis. But you know, you need to cut your alcoholic carpenter some slack. Flakiness and shitty carpentry are a disease, and he needs help.
I think a lot of people take that class. What I didn’t mention is that one of the people who came to wrap up our art made some loud clunking noise in the bedroom. I ran in to see what it was. “Oh, I just lightly bumped some of your ceramic pots here. Everything’s fine.” I went back in to inspect more carefully after he left the room, and he said, sounding insulted by my lack of trust, “You checking to make sure I didn’t *break* anything?”
Oh, I’m so sorry. I think it’s an inherited trait. I have gotten better, but I’m still intimidated by contractors. I tell them I want floor covering with NO sticky tape, and I get told that “the kind of tape we use doesn’t leave any residue.” I believe them,only to have to get someone else to remove the gook. But then, of course, I tell everyone how firm I was in demanding perfection, because I believe my own deceptions, too. And if I buck the “don’t tell me how to do my job” attitude, they might not love me. Can’t live with that.
Great! I got your feet, and contractors who paint over wallpaper.
Can we get a family deal on Working With Contractors class? I think the people you use just don’t finish their sentences. What they mean is, “the kind of tape we use doesn’t leave any residue that you can’t hire someone else to scrape up.”
Glad to see your blog again…always makes my day.I’m the same, feel like I am questioning their “skills”…the men who do my lawn each week insist on blowing the cut grass somewhere, even when we have told them not to bother…besides the noise, the smell of the gas coming from their nifty backpack blower gives me a major headache..how in the world do they breathe? Besides I explained I live in a very windy area and anything on my lawn gets blown away on its own including my dogs toys so why do we need to blow the grass? um more time to put on the bill? Needless to say I cringe, close all the windows and wish my husband was home who has no trouble telling them to zip it!
Thanks, Barbara! You know I love hearing that.
You can join me and my friend Vic when we enroll for Confrontation 101. Maybe your husband can teach it.
I am a terrible employer, especially at home. I’m a bit better at work because there are rules and stuff and I feel like I have a good instict about who will be a good lawyer and the right fit for the firm, etc but I am still bad about giving constructive supportive feedback instead of just talking shit about people behindtheir backs. I’m working on it though. At home I totally suck. I think it is because in the domestic sphere it always reminds me of my mother who was terrible — she was every “live in”‘s best friend until she was stressed and then she screamed. It was humiliating and totally complicated by class, race and betty draper-like gender issues placed in the 1970s. She has evolved a ton and is actually incredibly progressive these days but those early years are burned on my brain. I also hate confrontation so I end up just living with terrible “help”.
Despite what you’d think from Sesame Street, those issues were still totally alive in the 70s. I don’t think your mom was that far behind the times. And of course we know she’s hard-wired to scream.
Do they have a Confrontation for Beginners class at the Learning Annex? You and I should go.
I wish you had asked me for a grout guy! I have the world’s best grout guy (I’m going to assume there is no way for you to check the truth of that statement)
Contractors are like doctors. Its hard to question their authority… they are experts (but unlike doctors, don’t have a degree on the wall proving it, and don’t have malpractice insurance when they get paint all over your dresser)
Dammit, Cassanos! You’ve got a grout guy? I should’ve put out an APB.
I might need your grout guy to come and finish the job these slobs did. They were nice guys, but by no means were they grout guys.