How to find a trusted contractor
Start with people who have hired the trade before you. Ask your agent, your neighbors and your friends who they used and how the job went. Then check the contractor's license with your state, look for complaints, and get written estimates from more than one company before anyone starts work.
How do I find a good contractor after buying my first home?
Ask people who have hired that trade before. The FTC's first suggestion is to get contractor recommendations from people you know and trust. The list your agent sent you counts, because it's a recommendation from someone who has sent other clients to these pros. You should still run the checks below on every name, your agent's included.
When someone gives you a name, ask what the job was, whether it finished when promised, and whether they'd hire the company again. Then get written estimates from more than one company. The FTC also warns against simply picking the lowest bid.
How do I find a trustworthy handyman when I just moved and don't know anyone in the area?
Ask the people you do know in the area, starting with your agent. Your agent works in your new town and may already send clients to a handyman. Coworkers and the neighbors you meet in the first few weeks are worth asking too.
Give a new handyman a small job first. Hanging shelves or fixing a running toilet shows you whether they arrive when they said, clean up and charge what they quoted. If that goes well, you can trust them with a bigger job.
How much can you trust online ratings for contractors?
Use them to spot a pattern, and don't let them pick the person for you. A star rating can't tell you whether the company has done the job you need, or who from the company will show up. The FTC suggests searching online for the company's name with words like "scam," "review" or "complaint," which can turn up problems a rating hides.
A recommendation from someone you know tells you how one real job went. Put the two together: get names from people you trust, then search each one before you call.
How do you check complaints against a contractor?
Check with your local consumer protection officials and the local Home Builders Association, as the FTC suggests, and with your state attorney general's office. You can find your attorney general with the NAAG office lookup. The state license board shows whether the license is active, and some boards also show complaints and discipline.
For license lookups in every state, see how to check a contractor license by state. Oregon and Washington have their own step-by-step guide: check a contractor license in Oregon and Washington. If you're not sure which trade to look for, start with who to call for home repairs. Once you have two or three names, use these questions to ask a contractor before hiring.
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Your agent's people are one tap away
If your agent uses Proferral, nobody pays to be on their list, and the list opens with no app and no login. Proferral's license checks cover Oregon and Washington only, and it doesn't check insurance or the quality of anyone's work, so the checks above are still yours to run. Here's how your agent's go-to list works.
Your agent sends you the link, and you open it on your phone without installing anything.