re: What are some outrageous quotes you’ve gotten and did you keep a straight face?

"I'm from the Government, and I'm here to help"

I had a plumbing company come out to the house in September to give me a quote for installing a tankless water heater. To run the electric, and about 30' of gas piping plus the install. He quoted $8500 and that was with me going out and purchasing the water heater. I couldn't help but laugh

$30K for single zone, 4.5T HVAC.

It wasn’t the quote that made me laugh. It was his stern warning not to use anyone cheaper because there are a lot of untrustworthy folks out there who don’t know what they’re doing.

I had a tall (+30ft) palm tree that was dead in my backyard. I had someone knock on my door and quote $3,000 to remove it down to the stump with no hauling away.

Dang thing fell down during a storm. I borrowed a chainsaw from a friend and had it cut up in pieces on my front lawn within 3 hours.

Bartender at the poolside bar at Ceasar's Palace in Vegas charged me $84 for two bloody mary's. I did not keep a straight face showed a face of disbelief and yelled "WHAT ARE YOU SERIOUS"?

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pine trees

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firewood

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Uh?

Water leak between the meter and my house in 2005. I found it about midway on the 140 foot feeder. Pipe was that shitty black plastic crap they use in the late 80s. I wanted copper after seeing that. K5 was quoted. They also had to push it under 9 feet of concrete.

A “friend’s” company told me $4,800 and later came back with $3,600 when I balked. Friend/owner called to sweeten the deal.

I called the water company and asked who they recommended. It was mentioned that a water company employee did weekend jobs and also provided a warranty. They quoted $1,200.

$1,200 fixed it at 1/3 the original quote, trenched, proper depth, K5, bored under concrete, all good.

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$30,000 to get a tree cut down Shopped around and got it done for $4,000

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That’s someone who had enough business and didn’t want the work.

Team Toyota sales guy in 2017 after the BR flood. Hits me with a 8K profit deal on a new truck. Went to allstar and bought the same truck and saved 7K. Frickin hate car salesmen and all the games they play.

Dude gave me a price of $37,000 to clear a 1/3 acre lot in a subdivision recently. I did not keep a straight face. Got it done for $6500 which was still too damn much but within $1000 of 2 other quotes.


Got a quote from a builder of spec houses to build one of his standard models to the same finishes as those in a development a half mile away 6 years ago. $450 a square foot. I did not keep a square face and told him I was sorry he was going bankrupt. He asked what made me think that and I pointed out that the same house, including the dirt, realtor and development costs, that he was currently working on....several of them simultaneously I might add, were listed for $135 a foot and he had to be losing a pile of money on them. He told me he had no such houses he had built. I asked him if he was building the houses, he answered yes. I asked him what they were listed at, he told me $405K. I asked him how many square feet they were. He said 3000 square feet. I asked him how much $405k was divided by 3000. He said he wasn't certain but it wasn't close to $135 a square foot. When I showed him the math he was still positive there was no way he was building and selling those houses for $135 a foot. I am not certain he did not realize he was indeed building and selling them for that. He was adamant, however, that he was far from being bankrupt which could only mean one thing...$450 a foot was an outrageous number to pull out of his arse or he was not in the business of building houses to make money but instead to lose money.