June 19, 2026
Five things to check before you hire any contractor
Licence, insurance, references and two questions that separate the companies who finish from the ones who start.
You are about to hand someone a large amount of money and the keys to your house. These checks take an afternoon.
1. The licence, verified yourself
Ask for the licence number and look it up directly with the state board. Do not accept a screenshot. The number is public and the lookup is free.
2. Insurance, in writing, current
General liability and workers’ compensation. Ask for the certificate and check the expiry date, not just that a document exists.
3. References from finished work, not work in progress
Anyone can produce a happy client at week two. Ask for people whose projects closed at least a year ago, and ask them what went wrong and how it was handled, because something always goes wrong.
4. A written scope with exclusions
What is included matters. What is explicitly excluded matters more, because that is where change orders come from.
5. Who is actually on site
Ask who runs the day-to-day and how often they are there. A company that cannot answer that clearly is a company where nobody is.