Ohio Avenue

Lead-pipe estimates in the mail (Feb. 3-6)

Please send the estimates you received from Pertzborn and Jepa, or leave a note in the mailslot of 133 Ohio. It sounds like Jepa won't give a discount, and Pertzborn may not be willing to give less than the 5 percent mentioned in the quote, but at least we can determine how many people prefer Pertzborn. As of Thursday evening, three people have bids for $100-$150 less with Pertborn (including the 5 percent discount).

Stuart's report: Well, the plumbers done come and gone. Hopefully they got everyone. They said they did.

Here is how I think it works from here.

Both plumbers will send estimates to each person individually. Jepa said he just bid a low price, and there wasn't a discount. Pertzborn people will be eligible for a further 5 person or more if someone wants to negotiate, maybe. so if you get both bids, and Jepa is lower, just sign it and mail it back to him. If Pertzborn is lower, you should contact someone, me or karen for the moment, but maybe someone else will be in charge of coordinating with pertzborn. (Karen adds that Brent is willing to do that.)

I have to say I liked Jepa quite a bit. Politically like-minded, real
friendly, and talking about going the extra mile to make sure the job is
done well. My guess is that most estimates will be fairly close to each
other. If that were true for me, I'd go with Jepa, even without a further
discount. But Pertzborn was fine, too; he just sent a flunky because he had a meeting.

That's the news. expect estimates in the next week, and work to begin
sometime in the next two months.