Paul Clisham Painting & Decorating

Do you even want our business?
My family and I were really looking forward to working with this company to work on our house. They were referred by another family member who lives up the street from us. I called on a Friday afternoon around 2−3pm during their office hours and only got to the –owner’s– voicemail. Left a message and didn’t get a call back until Monday.
When the owner called back it took me a second to remember who he was since several days had passed. The demeanor in which he returned my call didn’t help. Not that he was rude, but not professional either. It was more like hey, this is so and so, you called? Rather than Hello, my name is…, I’m calling from… and I’m returning your call regarding… Huge difference.
We agreed that he would come do an estimate a couple days later on Wednesday am. He came on time and took a look at the house. Wrote down all of our requests and concerns. The estimate took less than 10 minutes which involved him just quickly looking at the front and the back of the house,.
The following afternoon (Thursday) we received an email quote from his office manager. I replied to confirm receipt. When I opened the pdf, we almost keeled over from shock. Almost $ 10 grand. No rhyme or reason or anything. Just a basic summary that sounded like «we’ll prep and paint your house, front and back with two colors in front and patch whatever cracks there are». All the things we talked about, the dry rot (pdf states it will be extra), the removal of a planter box, the window guards, (not even on estimate), etc. weren’t even included in price. The quote was over 3 times the amount of EVERY place we had called to get an estimate from. It was even 3 times the amount my referring family member paid who lives in our neighborhood. So after it’s all said and done, we’re looking at between $ 10k — $ 15k. Come on, this is a small family home located by Portola/​Bayview.
I emailed back the office mgr that night explaining to her our disappointment that the price is so ridiculous with no explanation whatsoever of the breakdown, asking how this was calculated since no measurements or anything was ever done. Did you guys seriously just off the top of your head look at my house and say, hmmm how about $ 9,840.00? Explained to her that I wouldn’t even have any way to compare quotes if I don’t know why I’m paying $ 10k versus what someone else quotes me. Better brand of paint? More labor? More man hours? More repairs? (I doubt it since it specifically stated the dry rot was «extra».) Not a clue. Point is not the money but how we can justify it?
I did get a bizarre email the following night (Friday ⁷⁄₁₈) from the office manager. I received it at 10:52pm Friday night. However it was –DATED– for ⁷⁄₁₇ the day before at 9:59am. This was dated several hours before she sent me the estimate on ⁷⁄₁₇ 12:32pm. The ⁷⁄₁₇ 9:59am email states, «I am in the process of typing up your estimate and I need some information from you. Please call me at the number listed below. Thank you.». Well we all know that she sent me the estimate anyway several hours after that. Also I don’t know why anyone who wants your business would expect YOU to call THEM for anything. Other than the bizarre email, NO ONE has called me since nor responded to my email requesting a breakdown of the quote and estimate for the other things we asked them to look into.
Would I recommend this company for residential customers? No. Not unless you dislike being treated like a human being, have a blank check waiting, or you’re a large project (commercial) spending someone else’s money. I get the feeling that we were given a ridiculous quote because they didn’t want to help us and probably wanted us to go elsewhere… it was discouraging enough that we have decided to take a break from all this and revisit it another day.

These guys are the best painters ever! Very clean very neat and perfect execution! We only have Paul and his crew work on our house… You will be extremely satisfied with their work!!!

After being blocked into a parking spot by their truck, I sent an email asking the driver to be more considerate of others when they park.
The response from the owner of this company aggressively responded to me and told me I was a «moron», «dumba**» and suggested «I get a life».
Painting skills or not, this particular email was incredibly offensive and prompted me to share it with the Unilocal community. Certainly there are other Painting companies that have a level of respect that is needed to be successful. Paul Clisham Painting does not have this.
I suggest finding a company with better business acumen.