Originally Posted by tangledweb

I contracted my first home and learned my biggest lesson right out of the gate.

All decent subcontractors are hooked up with regular builders. The ones who aren't - usually suck. I wound up firing my drywall crew and had to finish the job myself. They filed a lean on my house and luckily I had photo documentation to back up my claim. I wired the house myself because no decent electric contractor would do the job for what I thought was a fair rate. The house wound up taking 9 months to build but in the end, I saved a bundle.

I hired a good contractor to build my next home and we put a 'ball-breaker' clause into my contract. I didn't break his balls every day (even though I quietly checked on his progress each day) and was generally easy to get along with. He wrote me a check for $11,000 when we closed and said it was worth every penny.