080919d

So this guy came walking down the street, and talked my wife into hiring him to paint our house. The house definitely needed a new paint job. We have lived here for 25 years, and only painted it once before. Plus, eight years ago, a tornado threw things at the wall and knocked a few holes in the siding. We never fixed them. Anyway, he quoted a price, which we checked out, and was high but reasonable. So she told him we would have to save up the money, but we would have it in about eight months. That was too long for him to wait! He gave the impression they had no work right then. This was not true. So he cut quite a bit off the price if we would start right away. We agreed, and they started painting. Then he said I needed to have my ramp replaced. This was not quite true, but it would be soon. He quoted a reasonable price and I said we could do that after we finished paying for the painting job (we had three months to pay). Well that was too long for him to wait. So he said he would cut a good bit off of that price if we could pay sooner. We agreed, and they started working. They have been doing very good work. and they have finished more than half of the two jobs. But he has already come back to me to ask me to pay sooner than we agreed in exchange for a further reduction in the price. I explained that I didn't have the money he wanted and that that was why I had agreed to the schedule we had settled on. He kept on talking and I finally agreed to pay as much as I could then (which wasn't really very much). So now, there's some more painting to do, a board that he promised to replace, ramp staining to do, and work has slowed to a crawl. In one sense, this does not bother me very much. I still owe him half of the money, and he is not getting any of it until they do more work,.and he is not getting the last of it until everything is done. But it is nerve-racking coming home to see that nothing was done all day, to hope that he is not about to ask me for more money, and to wonder whether I will have to turn ugly in the end to get him to finish. Stay tuned!