If you’re like most homeowners in Virginia, you probably dream of having a beautiful deck to relax on in the spring and summer months. A well-constructed deck can be a great addition to any home, but finding the best contractor to build it for you is essential.
Not all contractors are created equal. When looking for the right deck contractor in Virginia, it’s important to do your homework and carefully evaluate the skills and track record they bring to your project.
To build or renovate your deck in Virginia, finding the best deck builder is imperative. There is no room for error in selecting a skilled, experienced professional for your project. This article will provide guidelines to identify the best Virginia deck builders for your dream deck and why PWHI is that deck builder!
Searching For The Best Decking Contractor
You should keep a few things in mind when searching for a deck contractor. First, you want to find an experienced deck builder with a good reputation. The best ways to find a deck builder are generally through online research or referrals from a friend. Each option comes with its pros and cons. Once you’ve found a few potential contractors, ask them for references. This will allow you to see some of their previous work and get an idea of their quality.
Friend Referrals
One of the best tools for finding a good deck builder is a referral from previous clients or someone with direct experience working with them whose word and perspective you can trust. Having a report on the builder that’s this direct can be a godsend, but it does come with certain caveats.
When assessing a friend’s referral, you should consider how much experience with the deck builders it’s really based on and how many projects or renovations they’ve done with them. On a related note, you should also consider how much of a basis for comparison your friend has with this kind of contracting work. A homeowner not experienced with deck construction might be more easily impressed than someone who’s worked with various contractors.
You should examine the projects that led to your friend’s referral are similar to the ones you’ll be undertaking. Having a range of contractor prices would be beneficial to get a better idea of whether your friend was charged a fair rate. For all these reasons, referrals are a great beginning to your search but shouldn’t be the end.
Online Research
Online articles and reviews are an increasingly common tool for homeowners seeking professional deck builders or other contractors. Sites like Decks.com or ANGI (formerly Angie’s List) provide a searchable contractor database that displays past customer satisfaction ratings. Deck contractors can also attract customer reviews to social media outlets like Facebook. They will often have their own websites showcasing their services and past projects they’ve worked on.
The things to keep in mind with online sources are:
- Partiality — Most online sources speak with an agenda; that can even be true of customer reviewers who might “review-bomb” deck-building companies for reasons mysterious to the rest of the public.
- Manipulation — Fake positive reviews created through “sockpuppet” accounts are a common way to manipulate online reviews. Multiple 5-star reviews from “customers” with similar writing styles and voices are likely to be artificial.
- Selectivity — Online directories of deck building companies often are not comprehensive, so relying on them entirely to help you find information on the best local contractors can lead to missing out on potentially important candidates.
The best kinds of online customer feedback are video testimonials, but still — even with the caveats noted above — other customer reviews, online sources, and pictorial documentation of the deck builders’ work can be excellent cues for finding the best deck builder for you.
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The Basics of Vetting a Deck Contractor
You should review at least three potential deck and patio builders for any project you’re considering. There are certain fundamentals when having early conversations with deck building companies that will help you identify the good contractors and screen out the bad apples right from the beginning.
Remember: You Get What You Pay For
When getting quotes from potential deck builders, keep the adage “You get what you pay for” in mind. Extremely low quotes and labor costs are often a giveaway to a contractor that lacks the expertise to even cost out the job and specific materials needed to build a deck, let alone finish it. High-end quotes often reflect high expertise and the use of high-end materials and technology.
Identifying the middle range of the quotes you get will often help you pick out a solid contractor for those who don’t have a lot of budgets to play with. Most of the better contractors on the market will provide financing options to help make your project more affordable without unrealistically lowballing the quote.
Faster Isn’t Necessarily Better
A good deck builder will typically have a busy schedule. They’ll do their best to get back to you about consultations and quotes promptly, but it’s not necessarily a good sign if they pick up their cell phone any time of day. That’s a hint that they’re not necessarily hands-on at the job site, which most of the best deck contractors are.
Likewise, a good deck contractor will be available as soon as they can to carry out the work you need. Still, if they’re dedicated to quality and client satisfaction, they won’t bump existing clients in a rush to get your business. The upside is that they won’t bump your project down the priority queue when the next new customer calls. That’s a core sign of professionalism.
A lousy contractor, by contrast, is always available to build a deck right away. Generally, that’s either because they’re not skilled enough to be in demand or they don’t take the time to see projects to a successful conclusion before chasing new work.
What to Look for in Virginia Deck Builders
Once you’ve got a list of deck contractors to review and a handle on the most basic flags for good and bad companies, it’s time to get into deeper detail on their qualifications and expertise. Deck building have undergone dramatic growth as a field in the last decade, with an upsurge in the outdoor living market and accompanying evolutions in technology. The specialized considerations from all this growth make a deck-specific builder a necessity, and any qualified candidate should cover certain bases such as certifications or general liability insurance.
Credentials
A deck building company should satisfy all the legal and regulatory requirements to conduct construction and renovation services in Virginia. That includes:
- Any necessary licensing and bonding in your jurisdiction
- General liability insurance and worker’s compensation insurance (to keep your home insurance from having to pay out claims in the event of a mishap)
- Knowledge of and expertise in acquiring all necessary permits to carry out your project in compliance with local regulations
A reputable deck contractor should have a solid rating with the local Better Business Bureau. Contacting the Better Business Bureau also gives you access to customer complaints against a specific company. Checking those records is another useful backstop to catch red flags if there are any to be found.
Experience & References
One way to gauge a contractor’s reliability in delivering a sturdy and well-built deck or carrying out a sophisticated deck restoration or upgrade is whether they have experience and a body of work to back them up.
An experienced deck builder should have a body of work to show you that demonstrates their ability to deliver up to the standards you need in a timely fashion. Suppose friend referrals or online reviews brought you to them. In that case, they should be able to supplement these with references of their own from satisfied past customers who can attest to the process of working with them, the quality and longevity of the resulting decks and whether they felt they got value for money.
Versatility
While some contractors specialize in a single material or product line, the best deck builder to work with will have a versatile range of offerings. They’ll deal in a variety of building materials and offer services like:
- Custom deck design
- Outdoor lighting
- Fire pit inserts
- Deck resurfacing
- Outdoor kitchens and screen porches
- Retaining walls
Working with a deck contractor that can call on a wide breadth of options and capabilities gives you the flexibility to try out options and adjust your entire deck project so the final product meets your needs and expresses your vision.
Beck Deck Builders in Virginia – PWHI
Since 1986, Prince William Home Improvement has been building custom decks, offering remodeling and patio services and helping homeowners in Maryland and northern Virginia build the perfect porch or realize the ideal vision for their hardwood decks. We’re a locally owned general contractor specializing in decks, patios and porches, known to over 16,000 satisfied customers as a great company that pays attention to the little details and always works to deliver a finished product of the highest quality.
The construction services of PWHI are available in Fairfax, VA, and numerous surrounding communities, including Virginia Beach, Falls Church, and Silver Spring. We provide a structured four-phase process that starts with a 60-90 minute free consultation, planning and installation phases and finally, a quality assurance and satisfaction phase that reviews the project and verifies it meets your expectations and our standards for high-quality work.
The entire deck building process takes several weeks, and you can rest assured that at the end of it, you’ll have a custom deck, patio or porch project that will make your outdoor space into an outdoor oasis. Our mission at PWHI is always to guarantee client satisfaction with competitive pricing and outstanding work.
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If you want to add more square feet to your home, benefit from custom deck design, build a new deck or renovate an existing deck, the experts at PWHI are here to help you realize the outdoor space of your dreams at a fair price.
We provide flexible financing, a military discount and a consistent and transparent pricing plan with no surprises or hidden costs. Above all, we guarantee that working with us as your deck contractors will lead to the satisfaction of seeing a great job carried out in the most timely fashion possible and at a price that won’t break the bank.
That commitment is what makes PWHI among the top deck builders in the state of Virginia. Contact PWHI online today for your free estimate, or call us at (703)-492-1294. We’re always happy to answer your questions and work with you to find the best possible solution for your home.
