Guide to Choosing the Right Fence Contractor in Raleigh, NC.

Now that we have determined the type of fence you need, read part 1, part 2, and part 3 of Guide to Choosing the Right Fence in Raleigh, NC for more information on the types of fence, unless you plan to install the fence yourself, you will need to hire a fence contractor.

• Insurance
• Three estimates
• Pricing
• References
• Address

Insurance:

No matter how you plan to find your fence contraor, probably the most important thing I can stress to you about choosing the fence contractor for your project is to be sure the contractor has general liability and workers compensation insurance policies. It doesn’t hurt to see copies of the policies and a legitimate contractor will have these policies, and will not mind showing them to you. Chances are the contractor pays a rather large premium to have these policies and rarely gets asked for it, so he will probably be more than happy to show it to you.

Three Estimates:

Try your best to get three estimates for your fence project. Here in the Raleigh / Durham, NC. area, there are plenty of reputable fence contractors to choose from. I find that most of my customers find us online by searching Google for “Raleigh fence” or another search term. My customers usually do one of three things to initiate contact with me:

1. Fill out the estimate sheet on my website, providing me with some basic information about the type, style, height and length of their fence. This form also has a place to put all your basic contact information so I can get in touch with the customer.
2. Call my number, which is on every page of our site, to schedule an appointment with me or to ask for a quote over the phone if all the information needed is already determined.
3. Email me to request a quote or an appointment for a quote.

I find that more and more of my customers are good at having all the information that is needed for the fence estimate before they make contact with me. This helps us to keep costs down as I am not required to drive to each and every estimate request (at the time of writing this gas is near $4per gallon in Raleigh, NC.) and initial quotes can be emailed to the customer to help the customer get an idea of what the fence will cost them. When the customer decides they are ready to proceed, I verify the measurements and inspect the property for where the fence will be located and contract with the customer for building their fence.

Getting three estimates not only gives you the chance to get three prices, it also gives you more information, each contractor may have different methods of building a fence, may use different suppliers (research manufacturers as well), and will certainly have different sales methods.

Pricing:

Some customers believe that the lowest price will be where they should get there fence from. I don’t always agree with this practice. Granted, we win fence contracts by being the lowest price, we are not always the lowest price. Be weary of a price that is much lower than that of the other two or more prices you received. This contractor could be using lower grade materials, paying installers less (sometimes results in less experienced installers), and also could be a part time fence guy which may or may not be around to honor any warranty work.

Ideally, all three estimates will be within a few hundred dollars of each other (depending on the size of the project). If that happens, go with the contractor you felt best about his/her ability to make you happy throughout the entire process. The estimator should be willing to provide any information about your fence and not try to hide or conceal anything. Be weary of contractors who try to push something on you that you didn’t want (there is a difference between suggesting something and being pushy). The contractor should encourage you to get three estimates.

References:

Don’t be afraid to ask for references from your fence contractor. They should be willing to provide this information. At the very least you should try to get some addresses of properties the contractor has installed fence on so you can drive by and see it. I usually have both available (references with phone numbers and addresses to drive by).

Address:

Be weary of any contractor who doesn’t have a physical address! P.O. Boxes are not the best sign for a reputable contractor. Now, I am not saying that contractors can’t have a P.O. Box, just that they should have a physical address as well.

I hope this has helped to enlighten you on this process, please feel free to comment on this or any other of my posts.

Keith Bloemendaal