Wow. Was supposed to be a client of this guy's, going through a general contractor. I called him up to ask how he arrived at the price he did and he ultimately told me to go to Lowe's or Home Depot and hung up.
This is the first time I've ever purchased carpet so I'm trying to learn about all the costs and everything and explained this to him. I mentioned how Lowe's (in-store) had told me to estimate 20% overage due to the 12ft wide carpet not being as wide as the room, but his employee told me that they don't do that here - the square footage is the square footage. The carpet was listed in the store at $3.49 sq/ft which included an integrated pad. Installation for normal carpets with separate pads was around $1.60, so the integrated pad I would have thought would have been cheaper. Yet our estimated price was over $6.50. I was just calling to ask how we got to that number based on what I'd learned and what I'd been told by his own employee.
He literally had no explanation on how he arrived at the final number, except to say "the initial budget I was given was X and we are within that."
All I wanted was an understanding and education on how purchasing carpet works. read more