I know the Bear fence owner personally. He’s a Clairemont guy. Runs a solid business and has for many years.

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I’ll offer up an alternative opinion regarding the value of your time and “DIY” work.

The important thing to understand is that you don’t pay contractors in pre-tax dollars. You pay them in after-tax dollars.

Lets say your time is worth $75/hr pre-tax. That’s about $150K per year, which is pretty substantial – certainly enough to afford a home. It means you are paying, say 35%, in taxes so after tax, your time is worth about $50/hour after-tax.

Also, consider that when dealing with a licensed contractor who pays for all the benefits and insurance, a basic laborer costs about $40/hr. Plumbers charging me $80/hour for their time to do work on my project – that’s $123/hr pre-tax. Not a bad rate if you can DIY.

You have to adjust for the fact that you can’t work as fast as a professional, but you also have to adjust for the fact that you burn time watching and managing contractors as well. Also, these guys will bid by the job to hide the number of hours.

I just cancelled a plumber because the numbers didn’t add up. He bid a job for $7,500 then reduced it to $5900 after some negotiation. A couple days before he was going to start he said “we’ll be done by the end of the day.” Hmmmm. Three dudes. One day. That’s 24 hours. Subtract out $1500 for materials and I get $4400 divided by 24 hours – that’s $183/hour after-tax. I did the job myself. Was painful and it took me 45 hours instead of 24, but I still made $110 after-tax. Not bad.

Again the critical point is – you pay for contractors with after-tax dollars and you pay them for liability insurance, workers comp, benefits, etc that you don’t have to pay yourself. If you have skills, use them.