Why such discrepant wallpapering estimates?

**How to find the right paperhanger for your goods and your budget. ** PRICING  Your question about pricing differences is a good one and applies to many trades.  Sometimes paying a higher price won’t get you better work but often it does.  You need to find out in real terms what the higher cost is buying you.  Maybe it’s better wall prep and priming (crucial for a successful installation) or attention to detail.  Maybe it’s experience and expertise that warrants the higher price tag.  Have an honest talk with the contractors who are quoting your project. Ask the paperhangers lots of questions without insulting them.  Ask them why they cost what they do.  Any good contractor will be happy to give you a little education and you may soon be satisfied that it’s better to go with higher bid.  Or the lower one.  COMMERCIAL VS. RESIDENTIAL  As in any craft there are levels that distinguish contractors both from the point of view of quality as well as what kind of customer they serve.  First there’s the divide between commercial and residential paperhangers. The commercial contractors do quantity work where speed is the primary concern.  Often (but not always) these guys do not have the experience, necessary skills, or temperament to do high-quality residential work, especially when it is complex.  They work almost exclusively with commercial vinyl and use double-cutting to seam the goods, a technique that has very limited use with residential wallpapers. Residential wallpaperers fall into three broad categories which I will liken to a Kia, a Honda, and a Mercedes.  But while all the cars will get you around the block not all paperhangers have the skills and experience needed to install all wallcoverings. 1\. KIA – Think low budget.  These are really painters who hang wallaper now and then.  They may charge as little as a couple hundred bucks a day and can, if they’re talented, get away with hanging simple papers fairly well.  Maybe.  Don’t expect perfect work – crisp trimming, tight seams, or spot-on pattern matches unless you get VERY lucky.  No matter what they claim no designer or architect in their right mind would hire this kind of paperhanger. 2\. HONDA – The big mid-price range.  These are dedicated paperhangers who know the basics of their craft.  Experience, quality of work, and cost will vary greatly and can result in very different quotes for the same job.  If they’re competent these folks can get the job done well with most standard wallpapers and probably many goods that require more skill to hang well such as silk, grasscloth, and papers that need to be table trimmed.  These contractors work for the trade (designers and architects) and often directly for homeowners who sometimes get better pricing.  Know that certain locations or addresses call for a higher bid than others.  It’s just how it is.  Depending on many other factors quotes will be based on rates that range from say $350 to $700/day or more.  Assistants are billed at lower day-rates.  Overall you will usually get better quality work, and work that lasts longer, from the higher bidders in this broad category.  They have the experience and the skills to know what to do and how to do it properly. 3\. MERCEDES – Superior performance and artful attention to detail.  These are the master craftsmen.  They have vast experience with all types of wallpapers, fabrics, and a wide range of specialty materials that are often wildly expensive and which require the highest level of expertise to hang properly.  Their work usually comes through designers and many of the wallcoverings they hang are available only through trade-only showrooms such as the D&D Building in Manhattan.  Contractors at this level can do things that the Honda guys cannot.  They can install anything beautifully and they charge accordingly.  At their best they are artisans with wallpaper.  They also know proper wall preparation and when it is essential to hang lining paper before you hang your top goods.  If they are out of work you may get lucky and snag one of them for $600/day in cash but expect that their bid is more often based on a day-rate of $800-1,200 including materials. IN SUMMARY the main thing to get is that all these wallpaper hangers serve a particular segment of the market and have different skill sets and levels of expertise.  The KIA paperhangers aren’t experts in any sense.  They may be able to hang the simplest of wallpapers pretty well but their skills are very limited.  The HONDA guys are dedicated tradesmen with some level of expertise and are capable of hanging many kinds of wallcoverings, but not all.  They charge more and are worth it.  If you’re on a budget it’s still wise to hire a dedicated wallpaper hanger instead of a part-timer.   The purview of the master craftsman is obviously the higher end of the market like a MERCEDES.  You may need one if you have purchased expensive, delicate, or unusual wallpapers, if your job is large or involved, or if the work is technically challenging.  Of course they can hang regular papers too, and often do, but you will pay a premium for their services. DUE DILIGENCE  Lastly, photographs and websites are all well and good but they can lie.  Bad work doesn’t show up in photographs.  Take the time to get references and, if possible, go see someone’s work in person.  Look to see that seams are tight, patterns match well, trimming was done neatly around doors and windows, and the layout of the design makes sense in the room.  Was paste left on the wallpaper?  Did they wrap corners well?  If switch plates were papered does the pattern precisely match the surrounding wall? Ask the customer about their working experience with the paperhanger.  Was he or she pleasant and professional?  This is important too. Sorry this wasn’t shorter but I hope it helps some of you down the line.

Ask for references and call them.  Our friends took a contractor’s pictures at face value and realized after he botched the job that he had probably lifted photos from someone else’s website because his work was so incompetent!  Of course this may not be the case at all, but if you have qulams about the bid sounding too late, just spend a little time checking a few references. I also agree, he may just be slow right now and willing to take you job just to fill in the gaps.

it sounds to me like the cheaper one does not have work lined up in the immediate future so may have gone in a little low to get the job so as to not risk being idle.  You are correct to question the lower quotes as taking the lowest bid is often risky – but since this person seems to have a website and be legit in other ways, you may be ok.  The one thing you can do is go get a third quote and see where it lands.  As a matter of intersest, when I was a building manager, whenever we vetted new contractors or started a project that we were really unsure of the pricing on ourselves or were doing projects which were over a certain dollar amount, we were required to get three bids from known contractors and as a rule we did not accept the lowest quote but there are exceptions. Steve http://brownstoner.staging.wpengine.com/tinkerswagon