our home improvements continue

As part of our home improvement process we decided we wanted to replace our unwieldy sliding glass door (pictured here) with a French door. We did that in Gilroy and we really loved it. What we thought would be a straightforward process, however, turned out to be more complicated than we expected.

We started with our go-to general contractor, who took care of the artificial turf in the front yard, our kitchen and bathroom counters, and, most recently, our kitchen track lighting. It turned out that it was not a straightforward task for him, and that he would be using an off-the-shelf unit from Home Depot. That wouldn’t work.

Renewal by Andersen does some heavy advertising in the area, so we called them and made an appointment. We spent two hours getting details we didn’t need to have and watching videos we didn’t want to see. The meeting ended with sticker shock.

We called a (more-or-less) local company which places ads in an advertising magazine that arrives in the mail. The guy came out, took some measurements, and promised to get back to us with a quote. We didn’t hear from him.

We then called a company that advertises in the Four Seasons monthly magazine. Again, we got far more detail than we needed and a somewhat high-pressure sales approach. The price was better than Andersen, but we thought it best to do some checking. We looked at their reviews on Yelp and the Better Business Bureau web site. Yikes! Deal breaker.

So I called the previous company and asked about the status of the quote. They were back to me in twenty-four hours with a price that was entirely reasonable. The Yelp and BBB reviews were excellent. The rep was here the next day, took final measurements, had us sign the paperwork, and he was on his way.

The lead time is perhaps six weeks, so it will be after the holidays and into the new year before we see our new French door, but the process has begun. We’re pleased and looking forward to seeing it installed.