Handy Men & Mrs Helper Kitchen & Bath

I am disabled with advanced Parkinson's Disease, and with the pain of cancer. I have very little energy to be able to keep our small ranch house (3 bed, 2 bath) clean, especially since we have 2 cats and 2 dogs, all of who shed heavily. I was talking to Faith one day about something unrelated and I mentioned to her about my difficulties with housecleaning. Faith had a solution for me! Faith sent over Pam so I could interview her for regular housecleaning. I pre-warned Faith and Pam that our dogs can be noisy when strangers are in the house. They both assured me that working with the dog noise was okay with them. Pam arrived on time to my home for the interview and even came with treats in hand for our dogs. Pam made friends instantly with our dogs not just because she had treats with her, but because she's obviously very comfortable around dogs (We have two Rottweilers). Anyway, so after the dog introductions, I gave her a tour of the house and asked her if she would be willing and able to clean for me on a weekly basis. She said yes, so I asked her when she could start . . . she was able to start THAT VERY DAY! I was THRILLED! So Pam gets to work and I was overwhelmed with the high quality of her work before she even got two rooms done. This lady gets on her hands and knees to hand scrub our tile and wood floors. OUR FLOORS HAVE NEVER LOOKED BETTER! Pam is willing to clean out litter boxes, move laundry in/out of washer and dryer, and make beds with clean linens! I couldn't ask for anything better. On one visit, I asked her if she had any suggestions for how to whiten the grout in our kitchen tile floor. I had to go out to run errands that day and when I returned I was VERY surprised to see Pam was still at our house. I found her SCRUBBING the kitchen tile floor grout WITH A TOOTHBRUSH! The tile floors in my kitchen now sparkle after she's been over them with her superb style of cleaning. She didn't ask for any extra money even though she'd clearly been there much longer than her rate covered (I compensated her with extra $$ the next week for her extra efforts). I now have Pam cleaning my entire house every week . . . it is so nice to have a clean house. What's even better, is that Pam uses environmentally friendly cleaning supplies that are non-toxic to humans and animals. I am particular about the cleaning products that are used in my house due to my illnesses so it is comforting to know that Pam is here to take care of not only the house, but also has the common sense to use SAFE products that will not harm me or my pet family. Trust me when I say we have tried everybody in the book for house cleaning services. Commercial places, small businesses, and door-to-door sales pitches for housecleaning. Eventually, they all end up being fired. One group got fired after they proceeded to spill shampoo on my bathroom floor and then closed the door with a cat locked in the room. The cat had to go to the Animal ER to get checked to make sure she hadn't injested any shampoo, and also to get the shampoo on her fur cleaned off. Another group proceeded to put the knobs back on my built-in stove top on BACKWARDS!!!!!!! That "mistake" cost me money to have an applicance service man come out to pry off the knobs. Yet another service managed to scrub the finish off my porcelain sinks. The sinks ended up needing to be replaced. The commercial services are a whole other story. We've tried probably all the commercial house cleaners out there. All of them start out great, but in a matter of weeks, the quality of their work diminishes. Now that I have HM&MH and Pam cleaning my house, I can rest easy knowing that my animal family, my house, and my personal belongings will be safe. I am going in for more surgery in three weeks and I have already asked Pam to do some extra work in the house while I am recovering. Without hesitation, Pam agreed to the extra work. Knowing that my house will be clean will help me to be able to relax and recover comfortably! I can only say Thank You to HM&MH, Faith, Rod, and Pam . . . but in my view, the words "Thank you" are not enough to describe my overwhelming gladness to have the entire HM&MH team in my corner. THANK YOU!

Steve and Rod are AMAZING with their trades. I had no complaints whatsoever. In fact, they were more than willing to accommodate my extra requests and schedule so that construction could take place without my husband knowing about it. My husband is due home tonight and I can hardly wait to show him his birthday present. Steve made additional suggestions for how to make the work bench even better than what I had first described and I am so thankful that he did. I know that there will be no regrets of "I wish I'd done this" because it's all been done. Can lights above the work area, a spot for a chair to slide under the counter, multiple electrical boxes, lots of cupboard and drawer space for storage, and a very nice butcher block counter top that can be beat on. Yes, I did get quotes for a lower price, but in my experience, you get what you pay for. And that's exactly what I got from Steve and HM&MH. If I'd spent less, I wouldn't have been happy with the results. By spending a little extra time, money and effort, I got exactly what I want, expect, and can live with.

We had used this company a few times before and one of the projects had a few minor things go wrong, but they did resolve it in a (fairly) quick and professional manner. In the end we were very overall satisfied with them and their work. So when we needed to re do our bathroom shower, we called them to get a bid. Rod, the owner himself was out to our home with in a few days to give us a quote for the work. We thought the quote was pretty high, especially considering on top of their price for the labor, we were still to provide the tile, the grout and the shower doors. We thought we would go ahead with them since we had worked with them before and were happy. We had faith that we would get what we paid for--we expected an outstanding job of quality work and attention to details. So the project was started on date planned and on time. The gentleman who they sent to do the work was very kind, very clean and professional. He was working for 5 and a half days on our shower as expected. He was on time every day. He cleaned up after himself every day. The marble I had purchased was on a palate in boxes in my garage. There were a few samples out so we all knew what the tile was to look like. Tile was warm pinkish marble with variances of orange to cream to pink to wine colors. When I got home the day most of the tile was laid, I looked at my shower and was not very happy. It was as if the tile guy did not even look at the tiles he was installing. He just took it out of box and put it up. Some were straight up bluish grey-NOTHING like the sample tiles. NOTHING. Not to mention some of the tiles were cracked and chipped. I do understand that with natural marble there are variances in color and there is this thing called "veining" which is natural fine appearances cracks in the surface. I get that. This is not the case here. These were tiles that had MAJOR surface cracks and defect and chips. And the miss-colored tiles looked COMPLETLY out of place. So, not yet even noticing yet the cracks and chips because I was so set back by the wrong color tiles being mixed in w my pretty pink tiles, I ask the tile guy about the miss-colored tiles. He says something about oh the colors vary etc etc..and I say yes, I know but these are WAY off. One would think that if you were installing tile that all looked like "tile A" and all of a sudden you get a box of tiles that were "tile D" , that you would move on to another box of tile? Or if one is cracked you would grab a different one? Long story short is I did have him replace a few...but there were so many, and he was already nearly done, I only had him pull out the worse ones. I take some responsibility for not inspecting and hand picking each and every tile before the start of the project. It never occurred to me to do that. Why didn't the "professionals" tell me to do this? Why didn't they tell me that they would not look at the tiles before installing them, and that they would install them even if they were chipped, cracked or the wrong color. So this is issue number one. Anyway, at this point into the project I decided to just "live with it" and that it was a live and learn lesson for myself. So then moving on to the shelves that were built from my tile. The short version of the story was that the first shelves looked horrible. Totally sloppy with 1 inch or more lines of grout in some areas. I will say that the installer was very willing to re do them. He was very nice...which made it hard for me in the moment to complain. In the end I decided the shelves were ok--except for the few cracks that happened in the process. I was going to just let this go too since he redid them once already. Well then after the job was all finished and I finally got use my shower I was able to really get a good look. This is when I noticed there were a few chipped tiles and some ugly cracked tiles. I also notice the grout lines are pretty inconsistent-crooked and some tiles are pushed in further into the mortar/ adhesive and others are protruding. The caulk is a little sloppy. I start thinking about the whole thing and what we paid and what we got. I call the company to express my concerns. We play phone tag and email tag for weeks. Seriously, weeks. At some point I send an email with pictures. I really felt that the owner should have come out to at least look in person at the job so that I could show them what I was not happy about. It is hard with pictures. I truly believe had the owner come out to look, that they would not be able to look me in the face and say that this job was done well. Nor would it have been a job they would want in their port folio of work. IN the end, if they had at least come out to look at my concerns and then looked me in the face and said there was nothing wring with the work, then I would not feel so sick over the whole ordeal. Funny how, to get the job, they were super responsive and fast to come out in person. And once there was a problem..no time of day. In the meantime of all this phone tag I get a leak from the pipe that connects directly to the shower. Their first response was to say that it "might not be related". When we told them we were looking at the pipe in our basement coming out of the shower base (leaking), then they did send someone to come fix the leak asap. But still were not interested in even COMING OUT TO MY HOME themselves to even LOOK at the finished project and what I was displeased with. This is really what bothers me the most about the whole experience. All they kept saying was that it was my fault for not inspecting the tile before hand and that the cracks and the sloppy grout lines were my tiles fault somehow. I had so much extra tile that was beautiful with no cracks or chips AND the right color. I don't understand. There was an excuse or justification from them for all my concerns. And this was all determined by them without even coming and looking at it! WOW. One of the owners herself told me on the phone that they had no time to come and look and that they were not interested (and I do quote) "we are not interested in re doing or fixing anything in your shower. We can offer you a couple hundred bucks as a resolution". She then several weeks later emailed me a contract stating that if they give me $200 that I would A: keep it confidential (mostly as in don't write us a bad review) and B: they would no longer be liable for any issues pertaining o my shower, be it a leak or a tile falling off the wall etc...We did not sign it nor did we accept to $200. I am sorry, but if you are going to try to offer some sort of refund for complete dissatisfaction don't you think it should be at least 10-15% if not 20% ? We paid $4200 for that work. They offered $200 to basically shut up and leave them alone. So no, we were not happy with this company. We would not recommend them to anyone. And we certainly will not be using them ever again. They are overpriced and unethical.

Ended up dealing with a subcontractor for Handy Men and Mrs Helper. Price was very high. We chose to go with another contractor.

They were extremely pleasant, effiecient, didn't wear shoes in the house and in that two hours they did a lot of work. Also cleaned up after themselves and were very tighty. They were wonderful and I can't wait to use them again!

My husband and I came up with a list of 9 things that needed to be done, thinking that if the first three were completed it would be well worth the expense. The big jobs were redoing the siding by a door that had been leaking an fixing a whole bunch of the flashing along the roof line. Jason was at the house right on time, and did a fabulous job of completing ALL the jobs! The workmanship was great, he was very professional, and we will definitely be hiring him for big and small jobs in the future.

He was expensive, other than that he completed the job well . Hd did what he was supopose to it just seemed expensive for three doors and a small drywall repair.

They are knowledgeable. They are professional. He showed up on time, he knew what he was talking about and knew just what to do. We didn't know what parts he needed and he was able to work with my husband who met him at the property and he gave him a list of things that he would need and while he did some things, my husband went out and got some of these parts and then brought them back. And between the two of them, they were incredibly efficient. These guys are great. I don't know how competitive they are but I certainly felt that their price was very fair. The quality was excellent. They are on our call list. We have them on speed dial now.

Before calling H&MH for an estimate, we worked with and decided not to use two other Angie?s List A-rated re-modelers, including one we had used previously with very good results on one small project. Each of the other two contractors was slow to provide an estimate, gave sketchy project proposals, and missed important details of what had been discussed. The other contractors also wanted us to get our fixtures (such as faucets and vanities) from locally well-known, list-price bath showrooms. We asked for contractor?s discounts from the showroom list prices; none was offered. We were so discouraged that, truly, we almost gave up on remodeling our two bathrooms. But then we found H&MH. In only two days, H&MH gave us a far more detailed estimate than we?d gotten from the other two contractors, and all the details in the H&MH proposal were correct. Rod listened! We got lots of helpful advice on products and materials when we asked. Rod suggested using amazon.com or other online retailers (or anyone local we wanted) for fixtures and materials. We got a 30% H&MH contractor?s discount on tile from a very good local tile store (Tile Shop) and ordered the countertops through Home Depot. Getting stuff this way worked great. The selection for fixtures available online is much better than what showrooms offer, the prices are substantially lower, and you have the benefit of customer feedback. (Some of the products recommended by the local showrooms had too many negative customer reviews online.) We got highly-rated, solid fixtures that felt more expensive than they were, delivered inside of one week with no unscheduled delays or wrong or broken merchandise, problems that the other contractors warned would happen if we tried to get fixtures online instead of through the showrooms. I?m sure online delivery mistakes happen; problems can also occur ordering from list-price showrooms. Be careful who you order from online, and it will generally go very well. H&MH (with a special shout-out to Heath and the paint and mud crew) showed up consistently as promised and stayed on schedule. There was only one installation glitch, a leak, and the installer came back and fixed it not in two months, not in two weeks, not in two days, but in two *hours* (and he lived 40 minutes away). The service has been outstanding. We have more small projects pending with H&MH, and they have our unqualified recommendation. Play fair with H&MH, do your homework, and follow HM&H?s advice, and you will have a win-win experience.

This is our third time using Handy Men and Mrs. Helper. Faith Southard never disappoints in her outstanding customer service. She is professional, knowledgeable, and organized. We had Maciej and his crew of painters out to our home. They have done prior interior painting projects for us. Maciej and his painters take great pride in their work, and it shows. The work they do is beautiful! (note: I am very fussy). On this visit, they were scheduled to paint the exterior soffits of our home. They were punctual and extremely professional. Work was done in a timely manner (mother nature not helping) and they not only left the work site clean, they were respectful of our new landscaping. Maciej was in constant contact with me regarding the weather and the time schedule. Their customer service went above and beyond the norm. There were no surprises with the quote that was given. It was comforting to know that the job was being done correctly with a reputable company. Faith did her usual follow up, leaving no question on the sound integrity of their business and the people who work for them.

I hired Handy Men and Mrs. Helper to finish off a house painting project that was years in the making. I had painted every other room in the house except for my living room that had a vaulted ceiling. The ceiling is a bit higher than I was comfortable dealing with and I felt it was better left to a professional. The service I received was excellent from start to finish. For starters, Faith replied to my initial message very promptly which I appreciated. I never even heard back from the other three contractors I contacted. Perhaps they felt my job was too small and not worth their time. I never got that impression while speaking with Faith. Within a few days Fena arrived to do the estimate. Fena is wonderful! She is very attentive and made sure she noted all of my concerns. A few days later I had a very reasonable quote and decided to go ahead and schedule the work. On the day of the job, Fena, Marek and his crew arrived on time (even a little early). Fena and Marek made sure everyone knew the scope of the job down to the smallest details. Once the plan was in place, Carlo and Nimo got right down to business. They first covered every inch of the floor with drop cloths and closed off an adjoining room with a plastic sheet. Then it was on to the prep work such as caulking, fixing cracks and nail pops. While Carlo was finishing up the prep, Nimo got right to painting. I was amazed how quickly they completed two coats of paint (both ceiling and walls). If there were any minor things that I wasn't 100% happy with (I am somewhat particular), the guys gladly took care of them. The room looks great and what took them a day would have taken me weeks. The only regret I have is that I should have called them a long time ago. I will definitely use Handy Men and Mrs. Helper for future projects!

Working with Faith to schedule the work was easy. She kept in touch with me until the handyman arrived. Our assigned handyman was Steve. Steve arrived around 8:30 a.m. and after reviewing the list of jobs he left for the hardware store for supplies. He returned shortly with the supplies and immediately got to work. He handled all the jobs beautifully and while he was here we added a few more jobs for him that he also completed. When he left, our home was just as clean as when he arrived. We are very pleased with the work that Steve did and we would love to have him do work for us in the future.

It was helpful that they were able to refer people to help me out. I feel like it was successful for what I needed

I called the number and received a voicemail. I chose not to leave a voicemail. Faith called me back a couple minutes ago saying she missed my call and was there something I needed. If I wanted a call back I would have left a voicemail. I told her I was looking to build a bathroom in my basement that it was framed out but was not yet roughed in. I told her I needed an estimate and asked if they provided free estimates. She replied by saying it depends on where you live and the kind of work required. She then said she had a few more questions and she could tell me. The first question was: What is your budget. I told her my budget doesnt matter, I was looking for her estimate and I would decide if it fit my budget. She pressed me again and I told her there were too many contractors that will provide me the estimate I need and not charge me for it, thanked her and hung up. She called me right back. I picked up the phone and didnt give her a chance to speak. I told her that I wasnt interested and dont harass me. This is ridiculous - I would never deal with this company.

They tore out existing baseboards, installed new ones, and did touch up painting along with that. They did a great job for us; they were excellent!

Great. They split the project by expertise - electrical and painting. They scheduled the right professional for each job to better match service and price. Everything was well scheduled and went as planned. I ordered the ceiling fan online and the electrician was able to pickup the right switch so the fan and lights would be separate controls. We had no existing exhaust fan and he did a great job cutting the holes and running the exhaust through a fan in our roof. Paint jobs on three rooms - bathroom and two bedrooms were great. I can't believe I bothered painting other rooms in my house myself.

Handy Men & Mrs Helper worked really heard to get our business. It wasn't a small amount of work so they really spent their time going over things with us. They are very thorough and continue to be as the project has commenced. Their workers are really good. They come in and bust through stuff. They are very thorough as well. They are on time and we've had absolutely no problems with them.

It went great. See my previous comments.

As I said in a previous review, I called Faith traumatized about the carpenters and plumbers I had previously hired who started jobs and never finished, or did poor work. Faith took very detailed notes about all my concerns and made sure Steve showed up with everything he would need to take care of our issues. Steve was fantastic, friendly, knowledgeable and very helpful. Primarily I wanted Steve to replace two outdoor spigots. A previous (non-Angie's list) plumber had come and told me he would have to rip out my interior wall to get to one of the spigots, but Steve was able to take care of the problem by drilling a small hole in the floor joist and saved my wall. He also did his best to patch up the hole in the ceiling neatly (tongue and groove wood planks), despite the previous plumber slashing it apart with a reciprocating saw. All the other jobs were done quickly and nicely. Probably the only kink in the works was needing multiple trips to Home Depot. I only marked down the price category because I might have thought twice about some of the smaller jobs if I would have realized this was a full day's work and would come out to $720 dollars (plus materials). That is just a lot of money! I do take some of the blame for this one though. Faith made the hourly price very clear, and Steve worked diligently. I don't think any of us thought it would take the entire day. If I would have realized that, I probably would have went with one of the other well-reviewed companies offering a deal for a full day's work. But you DO get what you pay for. I tried cheap, and had a miserable experience. This day was a little pricey, but everything was finished on time and done well!! And I will say Steve ran into a problem working a repair that was on our "optional" list -- some crazy electrical wiring in our basement. He stayed a little extra off-the-clock to troubleshoot because he was just curious to see if it could even be fixed without major rewiring (alas, it cannot)! Steve's perseverance is commendable! I am overall very happy with Mrs. Helper and I can't say enough nice things about Steve. I would use them again.

A non-Angie's List guy started to build a small pool deck at our house last summer. After 3 months, and numerous problems I sent him away. I called Faith traumatized by the experience and she was very helpful and hooked us up with Chuck. We loved Chuck! He came out promptly and had the deck finished in two days. I hated how the previous carpenter had built the stair to slope down from the deck towards the side of the pool (so the curve of the pool cut into the 3ft x 3ft landing that is required at the bottom of stairways). Chuck suggested we just turn the stairs to come out of the deck at an angle. Not only was he able to get it done quickly, it looks beautiful! Faith (the Mrs. Helper to the handymen) is very thorough when talking to you on the phone and finding out what you need. She asked for pictures after our initial chat and sent them to her carpenter to give me a ballpark estimate. She helped me very quickly and explained everything in great detail. My only overall concern is that I generally prefer to have a firm estimate before starting a big job. But Chuck worked by the hour. So my total came out to be a bit higher than my original estimate. This isn't a complaint necessarily, but just know that if you want a firm non-negotiable price ahead of time, then you will have to ask for that and see if that can be arranged (like for the painting I am having done later this summer by Handy Men & Mrs. Helper). It's probably a wash anyway, because Chuck made some adjustments mid-stream that probably would have increased the price either way. And if you get Chuck, have no worries. He is fast and efficient. He makes good use of his time and has everything he needs on hand to get the job done. He didn't waste time running around for materials and tools (like my last guy). He is super friendly and completely professional. I highly recommend him and would use him again with no hesitation. I also used Handy Men and Mrs. Helper for some odd jobs that I will review separately... just wanted to say I liked them enough to use them again (and again).

They were give total access to the house when I was not home and conducted themselves in a professional manner leaving the home clean and neat. The fixed all plumbing and even borrowed a scaffold from a friend to fix a high ceiling chandelier, so they would not have to charge me for the equipment. They exceeded my expectations for service.

Steve was wonderful to work with. Prompt and went right to work. He did awesome work. Looking forward to working with him again on another project.

Great overall just to much $$

Our previous handy man that we had used for years passed away. Handymen and Mrs. Helper are far better than I ever expected. They will always be first on my call list next time I have a list of honey-do tasks. If there was a grade higher than "A", Handymen and Mrs. Helper would be deserving of the grade. To say that they are excellent is not enough in my book. Being disabled with a condition that makes it difficult and painful to walk, I need help to complete even the simplest of tasks such as changing smoke detector batteries or burned out lights. What I love about Handymen and Mrs. Helper is that no job is too small, and no job is too large. I can always count on Handymen and Mrs. Helper to be here when I need them! Another thing I like about Handymen and Mrs. Helper is their communication. Faith answers email, phone calls, or messages promptly and with enough information so that I don't have to worry about anything when I use their services.

The communication begins with Faith who contacts the staff needed for the project at our house. She is always friendly and caring. Whoever is coming to do the work calls on their way, shows up on time, explains what they are doing and works diligently. The pricing is very fair, and the work is always done top notch.