Greater Lansing
Decks, porches & sheds
Boards are the part you photograph and the cheap part to put right. What matters is underneath — the posts, the beam, and the ledger where the deck meets the house. A ledger that was nailed rather than bolted is the fault that drops a deck with people on it.
What is actually wrong
A deck fails from the bottom and from the fixings, not from the surface everybody looks at. Boards can be sound while the ledger, the posts or the joist hangers are not, and the only useful thing anybody can tell you about a deck is what is underneath it.
Sheds are the same argument in miniature: the doors go first, then the base, then the bottom of the walls where the ground has been holding water against them.
Where this stops
When it is not a handyman job
This is at the top of the page rather than the bottom because getting it wrong costs you a wasted visit. Insured, and no contractor license is claimed or implied — the Michigan residential builder license is not held.
- A new deck, or an alteration that changes the structure, is licensed builder scope where labor and materials exceed the Michigan threshold; repair and replacement in kind is not. Where a job crosses that line you are told, and it is not started on the assumption nobody will notice.
- No work on structures attached to a building where the ledger connection cannot be inspected.
The work itself
What actually gets done
Deck and porch board replacement, resurfacing and railing repair.
Power washing, and staining or painting once it has dried properly rather than the same afternoon.
Step, stringer and handrail repair — including handrails that have gone loose, which is the one on this list that actually hurts somebody.
Shed doors built and hung, metal wrap, and gravel pads laid so the base stops sitting in water.
Rebuilds where a repair would cost more than it is worth, said out loud rather than discovered halfway.
This work sits inside Carpentry, which carries the invoiced price bands for the trade with the sample size printed beside every figure.
What it costs
There is no price list for this, and here is what actually decides the number.
The same three words describe a twenty-minute job and a two-day one. Rather than publish a figure that is wrong for one of them, here is what moves it — so you can work out roughly which end of it you are at before anybody comes out.
What is underneath. A resurface over sound framing and a rebuild over failed framing carry the same photographs and completely different numbers.
Material. Pressure-treated, cedar and composite are three different budgets, and a composite rebuild on old framing is money in the wrong place.
Height and whether guards and rails are involved, which have a code behind them.
Square footage for a resurface; number of posts and footings for a rebuild.
Whether it is painting or staining, and how much preparation the existing finish needs.
How to get a real number
Somebody comes out, looks at it properly, and you get a fixed price in writing with the work set out line by line and the exclusions written down as plainly as the inclusions. Coming out to do that is not charged for, and neither is working out what is wrong. If something is found once a wall or a floor is open, it is priced as a written change order and you decide before the work carries on rather than after it is billed. Materials are supplied at cost with the receipt attached, first-time customers get 10% off labor, and labor carries a one-year craftsmanship warranty.
If this is happening right now
What to do in the next five minutes, and what happens when you ring.
Before anybody arrives
- Push the handrail hard. If it moves, stop using the steps and say so when you call — that is the item on this page that is a safety problem rather than an appearance one.
- Photograph underneath as well as on top. Posts, joists and the ledger where it meets the house are what decide whether this is a repair.
- Look at the bottom of the shed walls and the ground they sit on. Water held against the base is usually the whole story.
Call the business line
(517) 505-7135Answered Monday to Friday, 08:00 to 18:00. There is no out-of-hours line and this page is not going to invent one — outside those hours, leave a message with the address and what is happening, and it is picked up in the morning.
On the call you get asked what is happening, what else in the building is affected, and whether it is still getting worse. That is how it gets decided whether this is our job at all — and if it is not, you get told that on the phone rather than after somebody has driven out.
- No trip charge
- No call-out fee or minimum
- No diagnostic fee
- No charge for a return visit
True across all 84 written quotes this company has issued. Most contractors in this market charge to turn up.
Or send the detailsWhen the right answer is not this company
- You can smell gas
- Leave the building and call the utility from outside. Not us, and not later.
- Water you cannot stop
- Your main shut-off first, then a licensed plumber. Every minute of this one costs money.
- Sewage backing up, or several fixtures at once
- A licensed plumber with a camera. That is the shared line, not a fixture, and a cable down one sink will not touch it.
- Sparking, scorching or a burning smell at an outlet or a panel
- Breaker off, and a licensed electrician. Electrical work here is repair and like-for-like replacement, and this is neither.
- No heat, or heating and cooling equipment that has failed
- A licensed mechanical contractor. That trade is not offered here at all, and knowing that in one phone call is worth more than a visit.
Where this is being asked for
One town has enough behind it for a page of its own.
This work is done everywhere on the coverage list. These are the towns where the enquiry record and the job record both have something specific to say, so they get a page that says it. The rest do not, because a page with nothing true on it is worse than no page.
Questions people actually ask
Can my deck be resurfaced, or does it need rebuilding?
That is decided underneath, not on top. If the posts, footings, joists and the ledger where it meets the house are sound, new boards on the existing frame is the sensible job. If they are not, new boards on a failing frame is an expensive way to hide a problem, and you get told that with photographs rather than a verdict.
Do you paint or stain decks?
Yes, after power washing and after it has dried properly — which is days rather than hours, and is the single most common reason a deck finish fails early. Preparation is priced as part of the job because it is the part that decides how long the finish lasts.
Book a deck, fence or shed visit
Photograph the structure from the side and from underneath if you can get there, not just the surface. Tell us the rough age and whether anything moves, bounces or has gone soft at a post base. If it is a shed, say whether you want it repaired or taken away, because those are different visits. Coming out is free and there is no trip charge.