Doug Dahlke

Daniel. I didn't see the reference to the labor costs in your link. Are you sure that the 10% labor costs you cite are all inclusive or are they just the direct labor hourly rate? I managed a textile plant for a number of years and our labor costs as shown on the budget were wage only. All the benefits were under separate line items.

Happy birthday Ron.

Happy Thanksgiving to all. Hard to believe another year is almost gone.

I agree with Micah. You need to have other aspects to your business. I have been painting too and that has kept me going while I build the PW business. This year I started doing roofs also. I worry more about extra competition when the economy is bad. Every weekend warrior with a pressure washer in the garage will be out trying to make some money when things are tight and unemployment is up.

My pricing will stay the same unless I have to haul water to a job.

I live in the level 4 restricted area and have not seen any rise in demand. There are also still people and businesses that do it themselves anyway. Either they don't know or usually they don't care that it is not allowed. My pricing has stayed the same and there are still plenty of compertitors around here that undercut me.

Hey Adrian. Been getting some guitar playing in? Things here are going alright. What's happening in Texas?

A good rinse is all I do. You just need to be mindful of what other areas are being washed. It is easy to splash solution back on windows that have already been rinsed. Use a good cleaner and rinse well you should be fine.

My opinions on why McCain lost. The Republicans had the presidency and both houses 8 years ago. The conservative base was completely charged up and ready to see the country lead in a conservative direction. The republicans basically told their base to grab their ankles and proceeded to spend the country into oblivion. In the mid terms they lost seats in both houses and basically had their heads handed to them on a platter. They didn't get the message. Then Bush and McCain both backed immagration reform. Another platform their base strongly objected to. Then they nominated as their presidential candidate a RINO. Another insult to the base. True conservatives no longer consider themselves republicans. The ones who cast votes for McCain did so more to vote against Obama, not to vote for McCain. They had their chance to run things and failed miserably. They deserve what they got.

My experience has been that this is not an easy business to build. You can get in quickly for a minimum investment compared to other businesses but it is hard work to make a living at it. I will be heading into year 4 in 2009 and am still not at comfortable income levels. With the economy the way it is now it will make things tougher for those trying to start up in my opinion. You have to be persistent and work your tail off to get things going. Keep cold calling, send unsolicited bids, get a website going, try direct mailers, join a networking group, hand out cards anywhere you can, get a Yellow Book or other directory ad. Just keep at it.

We had three all in one group. We live in a very small neighborhood and that was about all the young kids here. Not many people know this place is here.

I have to agree with John that quoting gutters can be difficult for the reasons he stated. We did a house last week for $150 that invloved a 32' ladder, getting on the roof of a covered porch to reach one area, raking up debris, etc. Had another quote last year for a ranch on a basement built into hill with gutters all the way around. Roof pitch unwalkable, uneven terrain on three sides of the house. You could tell by the look on the HO's face that the quote was way higher than expected. Homeowner never called back. We hand scoop everything and run hoses on the downspouts to be sure everything is cleared and clean up the mess on the ground. Most roofs here are not walkable so everything has to be done from the eaves off of ladders. Most we have been asked to do are also chock full of wet nasty crap. I have done some with small trees growing out of them. I try and base my quotes on the time I estimate it will take to clean them.

If you ever need to pull that rig with the tank full you will wish you had the larger engine.

People thought Ron Paul was a joke. A candidate like him is the only hope that this country will ever return to what it was meant to be. Almost all the politicians on both side of the aisle are dirt bags.

Things are slow here too. I have bid more shopping centers here in September and October. I am hoping they will lead to more contracts for 2009 and some more work in the remaining quarter of this year. I have been cold calling some other commercial locations without much success. Residential remains extremely slow. My son has a lawn service business and we put out 1,000 door hangers two weeks ago and receieved all of two phone calls.

On the drive I posted the pictures on I used Power House which is a butyl cleaner that has sodium hydroxide in it with bleach at 3% - 4%.

Here are some before and after pics of the drive I was talking about in the previous post.

Did another really nasty drive today. Pre wet and cleaned with just hot water. Rinsed well and then applied chems and let dwell about 15 minutes. Went over it again with hot water. The drive was exceptionally clean. When I went over it the second time I ran the surface cleaner sort of like a figure 8 perpendicular to the first pass. When it dried there were no lines in it either.

To answer the original question I x-jet my chems on.

I did a pretty nasty drive a couple of months ago. I tried the walks first and realized that going over this once was not going to work. When I got to the drive I did what was said above, cleaned with just water and the surface cleaner first, rinsed and then went back with chems and did it again. The drive came out great and the real estate agent that recommended me for the job couldn't beleive it came out that good. May have to start doing that as a normal procedure on the bad ones.

Are you sure about that price? I buy from Univar and unless the price has gone up I was paying less than $2 per gallon in 15 gallon containers. Are you counting the deposit on the drum in the price?

Congratulations. When you do good work it always comes back to you.

You may be right but do a Google search for companies in your area. The results may surprise you. I just did one for power washing Cedar Park Texas and there are 10 companies listed on the map section at the top of the page. I didn't scroll through the rest to see how many were there but it looks like quite a few. Before you wash anything for money I would recommend that you get a general liabilty policy. It will protect you and your customers. I still say you need hot water to do any volume of work on commercial. You can't remove gum without hot water. You can buy a cold water machine now and add a hot box later but if commercial is something you want to do I recommend you get a machine with at least a 5 gpm flow rate and price out a hot box for it just so you know what it would cost when the time comes. I'm not trying to bust your bubble. This is a business that is very easy to get into, making a living at it is another story.

Several things to consider. #1 This is not a good time of year to start a PW biz. I live in Georgia and can and do wash all year round but October thru January is extremely slow in the residential market. Temps drop, people are focusing on Thanksgiving and Xmas and business is hard to come by. #2 The economy is in the toilet. I do painting work too and the last few months I have survived on business that came from referrals and additional work from PM's I have contracts with. As far as new business goes it is tough going right now. People are holding onto their cash. #3 If you are serious about getting commercial work you will need hot water. Many of the larger PM companies are also going to want you to carry at least one million in general libility insurance and workers comp. It won't make any difference if you have employees or not on the WC they will still want you to have a policy. The WC policy will cost at least $800 paid in full at sign up. GL will probably run over $100 per month. If I were you I would keep researching this business but wait until after the first of the year to make any major purchases.

I have seen them on e-bay also. Don't know anyone who actually has one of their machines. From the videos they appear to be built pretty well.