Dealing with lowball bids

[Josh352]

Originally Posted by cmacsauto Hey ya'll. I just started up a few months ago, and was wondering how anyone else deals with competition bidders lowballing the job. I went to do an estimate for a lady to install sod, and when I got there, she also wanted a few trees limbed up, some bushes removed, and tilling of the ground. I made her an estimate, I think it came out to about $2400 with three pallets of zoysia sod and 15 yards of mulch ( it was a rather large portion of the property she wanted mulch on, and i couldn't talk her into pinestraw to make it any cheaper). Well, she called me back about a month later to come mow the grass ( currently fescue in real bad shape ) and complained that it was mowed too high and said something about figuring out what to do with the yard. When I asked if she had gotten the estimate, she said "yeah, it was way over price" like I was stupid for even giving it to her. I asked how much others had told her, and she said she had been quoted $950. It seems every time I go to do an estimate, something like this happens, and only a couple of people will actually go with the higher price because they think they are getting a deal from the other guy. Also, I have this guy that called about lawncare, and said he was paying 32.50 biweekly for mowing, edging weedeating, bush trimming, trimming Ivy, picking up sticks, and I don't even remember what else. but they were not reliable. I told him $30 if he signed a contract. I have done some work at his other home for witch I charged him $40 but he still hasn't paid, and I have sent him the contract 2 or three times through email, and talked to him about it last week before that because I had to update it when he decided to start a week later. He still has not responded back to the contracts or the bill for the work completed, and every time I try to tell him how I do payment, he wants to make it sound like paypal would be really complicated and says he thinks he wants to leave a check somewhere. The yard looks really bad, lots of dead patches of grass, and the bushes are in terrible shape as well. any Ideas? Should I go back to his other property and start at his main property? Wow, yeah thats a crazy low ball i would have charged $1,800 . I charge $0.80 per sq ft for z and $40 a yard for mulch. I get my mulch direct for like $8 a yard if i pick it up. I have been running into the same problem in my area. For bahia sod i charge no less than $.040 per sq ft if its over 8,000 sq ft and any thing lower my price goes up. i am getting underbidded by almost $0.06 per sq ft. sometimes lower which is nuts!!! I do get my sod direct as well. 18 pallets on a truck $20 per pallet with $450 delivery charge per truck and i still will not go that low. I am only landing 18-25% of my sod bids. Last couple years i had landed 80% of them. The only option i can say is wait them out untill they lose theire ***. after that, youll be back in the game.