Bathroom Remodel (touch up)

Pope

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Hi All,

Anyone recommend any contractors bathroom remodels and touch ups in the Ames/Ankeny area?

Remove wallpaper, new flooring, vanity, mirror are the top priorities.
You want to hire a contractor to do those things? I'm tempted to submit a bid myself. :)
 

coolerifyoudid

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Dude I'm ready to call one of those services to come and pick up the dog poop in my yard so I don't have to do it. Not speaking for the OP, but eventually you get to the point where you say... f*ck it, I'll just pay someone else to do it.
I still try to do whatever I can. But, I've replaced so many faucets and toilet guts over the years, that I've pretty much had my fill. If I can get a reasonable price to avoid having to contort myself under a sink to replace a faucet, I'll cut back somewhere else for the convenience.

The stuff listed isn't hard work, but I keep wondering, "Is this is the time I don't get back up" and "That is gonna be an embarrassing obituary".
 

clone4life82

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Hi All,

Anyone recommend any contractors bathroom remodels and touch ups in the Ames/Ankeny area?

Remove wallpaper, new flooring, vanity, mirror are the top priorities.
Good thread! We were looking at a little more than a touch up in ours (in Ankeny)and for 150 sf, we were quoted between 45k and 75k. Needless to say we haven’t done anything.
 

Agclone91

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Good thread! We were looking at a little more than a touch up in ours (in Ankeny)and for 150 sf, we were quoted between 45k and 75k. Needless to say we haven’t done anything.
Haven't done any remodeling so I don't have a great frame of reference, but those seem like the kind of quotes that contractors with full schedules throw out just to see if you'll bite. Basically, "I don't want the work, but if you'll pay this crazy price then I'll do it".
 

AgronAlum

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Good thread! We were looking at a little more than a touch up in ours (in Ankeny)and for 150 sf, we were quoted between 45k and 75k. Needless to say we haven’t done anything.

Those have to be the "I don't want to do this" type bids. Contractors will often look at a project and if they don't really want to do it, they'll bid like 5x or whatever so their bid isn't in the running. I'm guessing your project is probably a too much of a PITA for the return.
 

TitanClone

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Good thread! We were looking at a little more than a touch up in ours (in Ankeny)and for 150 sf, we were quoted between 45k and 75k. Needless to say we haven’t done anything.
That's insane. I replaced a vanity and floors in a small bathroom a few years ago for well under $2k. Granted went with relatively cheap tiles because my house wasn't anything fancy. Also saved a bunch when the vanity/counter was delivered with a crack on the underside of the counter. Took just the counter into Home Depot for a refund and they let me keep the cabinet for free, so only ended up paying for a new counter with the sink built in.

Only tool I had to borrow was a wet saw, but you can get one for $60 at Harbor Freight. The worst part by far was tearing out 30+ year old floor to ceiling wallpaper.
 

wxman1

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You want to hire a contractor to do those things? I'm tempted to submit a bid myself. :)
Always running into issues and obstacles when doing have turned me off from doing most projects. Extra trips to the store for new/different tools and materials along with the time figuring out how to overcome it is not worth it.
 

SayMyName

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OP would probably be better off hiring a general handyman for this type of work. Any serious contractor is going to jack up the price to make it worth their while for such a small job scope, given other priorities and higher-paying opportunities. Most won't even bid or call back to actually schedule the work.
 

Pope

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I live in Ankeny and recently retired from ISU so I've got a fair amount of time on my hands. I decided to completely redo the kitchen in my son's house which was on the smaller side and very dated (original kitchen from the 70s).

Took down the wall between the kitchen and dining area to really open things up. Tore out all the cabinets and floor. Completely reconfigured the kitchen so I had to bring in an electrician to do some re-wiring. Installed a new floor, all new IKEA cabinets and a stone countertop.

I'm biased, but I think it was a dramatic improvement and I only spent around $10,000 total. Going with LVP flooring from Re-Store and IKEA cabinets saved me a lot of money.

The whole project took about a month. I'm guessing a contractor would have charged at least $50,000, so I think I probably saved at least $40,000 doing it myself. Owe a big thanks to YouTube videos. :)
 

cyfanbr

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Kind of blows my mind that some contractors are willing to give a high bid just so they don’t have to do the job. Feels like a risk since people talk and next you know you are losing business opportunities because someone heard that your bids are crazy high.

I totally get just having someone do the work for you. Just had a bad wheel bearing in my car. I could have probably done it and saved some money, but with two little kids at home I figured finding the time and energy to do it myself was not worth it. Instead I just stuck to replacing the broken ceiling fan in my sons room. The new one works mostly ok… freaking electrical.
 
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FallOf81

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Dude I'm ready to call one of those services to come and pick up the dog poop in my yard so I don't have to do it. Not speaking for the OP, but eventually you get to the point where you say... f*ck it, I'll just pay someone else to do it.
This reminds me of the HVAC thread and all those who said ... why pay someone to do that, take it apart and fix it yourself ... or prepare it for summer by cleaning it and don't use a company to do an annual inspection. Yah, just what I want to F*** with.
 

SCNCY

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This reminds me of the HVAC thread and all those who said ... why pay someone to do that, take it apart and fix it yourself ... or prepare it for summer by cleaning it and don't use a company to do an annual inspection. Yah, just what I want to F*** with.

I think the issue/problem (although it’s not necessarily a problem) is that we have a lot of engineers and people who grew up in farms who are very handy. I think this breeds a lot of people who themselves are capable of doing hands on mechanical work, but may forget that not everyone is like that.
 

DSMCy

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This is the marketplace Siepker works for or promotes
People can post jobs for other people to bid on
They recently bought a house in WDM and completely renovated it to flip, using only their app to get all of the work done.
Definitely an interesting concept and they appear to be growing