Member-only story
Worst Day of Working for Myself
As my small staging business was just getting off the ground.
My partner and I had taken a job with of one of her family member’s neighbors.
We made our first appointment with the couple, but only the wife showed up to discuss what she’d wanted done with her project. It was a fairly easy job — painting, patching a few walls. In total, we’d been hired for three rooms. We were new enough that we failed to heed the wife’s warning that her husband was picky about how things were painted.
I’d thought, “That’s good. So am I,” instead of, “Picky? He’s fired people for not living up to his standards? Red flag, red flag! Abort! Abort! Abort!”
Fortunately, I’d had the good sense to see a lawyer in the past year, so I was able to hand over our “at-will, do-not-sue” paperwork, and insisted both homeowners sign. It’s probably the only thing I got right in the whole process.
The wife pushed us to go faster than the timeline we gave them, which we were mostly fine about, because our timelines allowed for unforeseen consequences. We were never behind schedule and usually ahead on our projects. My partner took on the bathroom, and I took on the basement bedroom, using the paint the homeowners had purchased and the cheaper tape we’d decided to try out.
