Customer Reviews

Be Your Own Contractor and Save Thousands

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There are other books on being your own contractor that are better. This book is not very insightful and offers basic ideas and concepts. For the price, there are better choices and more up to date books out there.

If you need this book, you're already in huge trouble if you're going to be your own contractor. It's full of basic information about building that anyone contemplating being their own GC should already know. If you don't know this stuff, hire a general contractor and you'll be glad you did. It's a little bit useful in guiding homeowners along the myriad paths of decisions that need to be made while building. I cracked up when I saw the "cost table", Pella windows for $2650. I envisioned a house with three windows. I checked the copyright date, and it was 1996. Prices haven't risen that much, so okay his house had maybe seven windows. The rest of the cost table was just as useless as data, but the format is useful. I have no problem with James Shepard's expertise, he obviously has built houses. This is a good self-test book to see if you're capable of being a GC for your own project. If this book contains new stuff for you, hire someone else. Much more useful are the "Code Check" books and "Building Construction Illustrated".