Mike Williamson

Anyone who thinks the US is even close to being overcrowded has never spent much time driving around it! Some of us don't want to adapt simply because someone else wants a strip mall where our houses are. Build your damned crap somewhere else. It isn't progress when you're taking away the property of one person to benefit the pocketbook of another person. It is progress when our freedoms and liberties are infringed upon by those with self-serving goals. Maybe he's simply sitting inside his house and enjoying the fact that it is his. Maybe he doesn't want to move elsewhere, and has no problems with the government...He just loves his home. That's a feeling a vast majority of Americans share, and something you seem to be lacking.

How is choosing to keep what you EARNED, and what you OWN, selfish? Sounds like your family ought to move 20 miles up the highway if reaping the benefits of a Walmart is what you hold dear rather than the right to keep what you own.

Another thing to keep in mind is that you can cut the price of citracleen quite a bit by buying it in drum kits. I think the cost is closer to $10.00/gallon for a 5 gallon jug, but if you buy a drum kit, it winds up close to $3.00/gallon. For a typical housewash, I'll use about 2 gallons, so I'm only using $6.00 in soap. Add chlorine and other additives, and I'm close to $10.00 for a typical housewash. For the results I get, I'm not worried about saving a couple bucks/day on soap. I'm happy with citracleen and see no reason to switch. Sure, in a pinch dawn will work ok, but not as well as a good professional soap. As Don pointed out, there are other products on the market that work just as well, but I just don't see the need to spend the time finding them and trying them out.

I believe the word he means to use is "tract"

I don't see how...I mean, if you're already going to incur the expenses of getting a customer to call you, give an estimate, etc, why not make as much money from the job as you can? Would you rather have one job that pays $400.00 and takes 4 hours or four driveways that each pay $100.00, and take 6 hours including setting up and breaking down your equipment 4 times, driving between jobs, collecting 4 different payments, etc? You already have everything you need to do houses, and it wouldn't take much to setup for roofs. Not sure how things are in other areas, but I RARELY get jobs where the homeowner just wants the driveway done. They either want the driveway done in conjunction with something else, or it winds up being an add-on service. If I had to survive on driveways, I wouldn't. Good workers? First, you don't want to spend the money to get into housewashing, but you're going to wait until you find some good employees? What do you suppose these employees are going to do? If it were me, I wouldn't even consider hiring employees until I was so busy I couldn't see my way out. Maybe I misunderstood your intentions in your business endeavor

I doubt it, but Starbucks regular coffee is brewed, just like Dunkin's. I understand the difference between the two, just wasn't sure what you were saying. Some places use espresso to make their coffee. My preferred coffee (for home OR buying it out) is Starbucks Italian Roast... a bit darker than their Espresso Roast

Dunkin Donuts is better than Starbucks? What do you mean you think people are voting espresso?

If it were me, I'd listen to Ron M....I think the guy is pretty qualified in the area of flatwork....Give him a call.

Why would you want to do only driveways? It takes the same equipment to do housewashing, and not much more equipment to do roofs. How many customers would you need each day if you only did driveways? You're talking a lot more marketing and a lot more expense driving from job to job, etc.

I don't get the local advertising, so I've never heard it. I haven't seen any ads on his website, newletter, etc, until now, but I very well could have missed it! Every once in a while, the local station here will screw up and play the WSB ads during the break, but that hasn't happened in a while.

Speaking of Boortz, for you Atlanta guys, here's what was on his email newsletter I got today... Wonder what that cost?

God I'm a lucky man...I don't get any of that stuff...Our rare disagreements are typically settled quickly without all the coded word stuff... :)

I'm all in favor of the fair tax...and I'm sure you're aware of Neal Boortz's book coming out the first of July...I plan to buy a copy, as I'm sure you will also. However, we DO have representation...it just doesn't always go the way you want it to. Is our system perfect? Far from it. It needs some MAJOR overhaul...but we each have representation. Does that mean that nothing will happen unless we want it to? That tax money won't get spent in ways we disagree with? Of course not..there's no system that will work that way, since we all want differing things. As far as things being spent that have nothing to do with us being free to live and work as Americans, there is a LOT of money spent that has nothing to do with those things. Who authorized that spending? Our representatives. A flat tax, though a good thing, won't change that. It won't change government spending, it will simply even out the playing field for all of us footing the bill. The ONLY way to change the spending is to elect leaders who will spend differently...enough of us have to desire to do that, and do something about it, or nothing will change.

God that brought back some memories...I was so happy when I got that new 2400bps modem...it was so much faster than that 1200...and then, when I went 14.4 I thought I was in heaven. Oh, and replacing that monochrome with color? Wow!! amazing how far we've come in such a short time.

I get where you're coming from, and I agree with CCPC, after seeing what all your $1000.00 job involved, I'd be relatively close to your cost, though likely a bit lower simply due to competition. The other thing you have to consider is that not every area has a large number of homes like this. Most of the homes here are relatively modest in size. I think most guys here try to upsell many of the things you mentioned...sometimes it works, other times it doesn't. Either way, our hourly prices are similar, especially when you consider the higher cost of the materials you're using.

You say you think your time is worth $250.00/hour, but would you pay your plumber that? A painter? Your mechanic? How about the guy who cleans your carpet or upholstery? If not, why not? Isn't their time worth $250.00 too? Your prices are about in line with what I'm dealing with here, and I'm fine with that. If I can do $500.00/day by myself, or $800/day with a helper, I'm more than happy.

Agreed, taxes are too high and the tax structure is skewed against achievers, but to expect that we're ever going to get back to a no-tax, or 3% tax system is just dreaming... The Boston Tea Party was due to a tax, yes, but a tax without representation. That's not the case with our current tax system.

I understood what you meant. I try to do the same thing here, though not so formally. I'm all for trying to help the competition improve their pricing, methods, and quality. It helps all of us. The ones who won't listen will wind up running themselves out of business. Of course, a new crop will be there next Spring. As far as cutting prices to compete, I get what you're saying. On the other hand, you have to be realistic. Say there are 40 bakeries in town who all sell the best bread for between $3.00 and $4.00/loaf, I won't do very well trying to sell the same bread for $10.00/loaf. Sure, I might get a few customers who just have to have the best bread and feel that they have to pay three times the price to get it...but those are few and far between. Most customers will buy the 3-4 dollar bread and get a great bargain. There will also be some who will go to the stale bread store and get it for 25 cents/loaf. As CCPC pointed out, advertising isn't cheap, and most of us can't afford the expense of reaching enough customers to find enough high dollar customers to keep us busy. If a person is a good enough salesman to sell for $10.00 what others are selling for $3.00 and sell enough to stay in business, then more power to them. Most of us aren't that good. A 3000sf house takes 8 hours? Maybe if you're washing it by hand... $35.00 for wash mix and "other cleaners"? I'd use around 10 gallons of wash mix for this house, at $1.00/gallon. $10.00 for rinse aid????? I use a good quality rinse aid, and use maybe 12 ounces per house...at $10.00/gallon, that's $1.00 in rinse aid. Here's a more realistic picture (at least for this area). 3 3000sf houses at $225.00each makes it $675.00 for 8 hours, or just under $85.00/hour gross. Figuring your costs, but increasing the employee pay to $120.00/day and my salary to $300.00/day, that leaves $171.00 for the company. That's $855.00/week the company puts in the bank The real point here is that everyone's costs are different. Some pay their employees low rates, some pay them high rates. Some buy top dollar chemicals, some use dawn. Some guys drive a paid-for truck and an economy rig, and some have a 2006 1 ton dually with a $15k trailer. Some guys pay $2.00/gallon for fuel, and some guys are paying $3.00/gallon. It's just unrealistic to say that a particular job should cost a particular amount in any given area. I'm all for getting top dollar, within reason, but you have to be realistic also. The market determines price to a certain degree, there's just no getting away from it. I'm not pointing fingers at anyone involved in this thread, so chill...but how many of the guys who think they're worth $200.00/hour for a housewash want their plumber, carpet cleaner, mechanic, or painter to charge $200.00/hour?

My post about honesty wasn't about what you charge, but about the comment made about price fixing, and the concept of "what the hell, you won't get caught". I fully respect your opinion. I don't think I said anything derogatory about it. I simply said I'd feel wrong charging homeowners more than I think the job is worth. I have a range of pricing that I feel is fair to me and the homeowner, and that's what works for me. Sure, I could say my time is worth more, but where do I draw the line? If I can say my time is worth $200/hour, then why not $300, or $400, or $1000.00? You say you'd be offended at $175.00 for a 3 hour job...figure no more than $25.00 in job-related expenses (chems, gas, etc)...that's $50.00 an hour. That's pretty decent money, even for someone running a business with all the business related expenses. It isn't GREAT money, but I just don't get why it would be offensive.

while you may not like it, that's the way it is. If we as contractors want to gripe about "lowballers" and "fly-by-nighters" who don't run legitimate businesses, don't pay insurance, don't pay taxes, then we'd better make sure that we're following the rules. You know what it takes to change things...I agree, the tax system sucks, but it is what it is right now. I also disagree with drug laws, but you don't see me walking around with a joint just because I think the law is unAmerican. The original? As opposed to what? I agree, to a point...get it where you can, legally. Price fixing isn't legal, whether you get caught or not.

I hope each of us took some time today to remember those who have died in service to their country. That's what Memorial Day is all about...Not grilling out and taking time off work and having a blast...it was intended as a day to be set aside in rememberance of our nation's fallen warriors. We enjoy all these things thanks to their selfless sacrifice.

Oh, sure...it's illegal, but what the hell, go for it! You likely won't get caught!! While you're at it, don't report cash customers to the IRS, hell, underreport all your income, over-report all your expenses...I mean, who cares if it's illegal...You gotta make money some how...and afterall, you probably won't get caught!!! Who wants to make money fairly and honestly...that's no fun at all!!!

Getting together with your competition in order to come up with agreed upon price minimums or pricing structures IS illegal...people have gone to jail for long periods of time for that type of thing. Not to mention, you're not going to get everyone on board...If I knew my competition was collectively trying to set a certain price, a relatively high price, then I'd be more than happy to undercut that by a bit to get a load of business. It's called capitalism, free market economy, and competition.

You can rationalize it any number of ways ($0.96/day, $x/week, $x/per square foot, etc) but the bottom line is this...If I tried charging $1000.00 for a 3000 square foot housewash including driveway and gutters, I'd have an awful lot of time on my hands. I don't care how you explain it, how much emphasis you put on quality, etc etc, the huge majority of people hare are just NOT going to pay that kind of money. Sure, I may find one sucker here and there who is willing to pay that, but they will be few and far between. The other issue I have is that I simply can't justify charging $1000.00 for what will take me 3-4 hours. Do I think my time is worth $250+ per hour? No, I don't. Personally, I'd feel like a cheat if I charged that much. Not saying you are, or anyone else...just my personal feelings.

It's basically a souped up fancy downstreamer that goes on the end of your wand rather than at the machine, and draws chems in through a feeder hose attached to it (like a downstreamer). It has a draw rate of 2.5 gallons per minute, regardless of the machine you're using, so the higher your gpm, the lower the ratio of chems to water. It's a pretty useful tool, but I've found using a good downstreamer works just as good and is much less hassle.