I'm a handyman. Ok, I'm a licensed general building contractor with liability insurance, yada yada. But I do the small stuff because I really like it better than larger construction projects. It suits me.
It also makes me a prime recipient for this Cash for Caulk deal working its way through Washington. Much of the work is stuff that people already ask me to do: replacing doors and water heaters for instance. But there is a serious catch to this program.
The rebates are certainly large enough to attract interest from homeowners, but for people like me this has the potential to be a huge problem.
The Elitist Washington stuffed shirts have designed this program for larger businesses that can both absorb the huge cost of being a bank for the government for up to 45 days and throw an army of installers at the money because of their huge advertising advantage.
If it is run like the Cash for Clunkers program, they will be unprepared for all of the submissions for payment. Because the relative cost of each transaction is smaller, there will be more of them. A lot more. Although payment should be within 10 days, which I could certainly handle, I would run into trouble if it went beyond 30 days. If most of my jobs were for this program, I'd be looking floating $5,000+ for a month. I just flat out can't do that.
Of course the most likely recipients of all this cash will be large companies that can most afford this program. Armies of Home Depot subcontractors will be pouring money into the corporate coffers. It's easy to see why. They have an enormous advertising budget.
If I have to submit and re-submit for payment this is going to be a burden for me as well. I'm just one guy and I don't have a staff to take care of this for me.
Of course, I might get nothing at all. The work that is being included in the Cash for Caulkers program will primarily fall to low wage installers. An installer is someone who is paid a wage and is only trained to a specific task. As such, they typically don't make much money. (By comparison I earn roughly 4X what a typical installer does.) What that means is that most of the money is going to administration and profit.
In construction, small operators like me can run circles around franchises and large companies as long as the work requires expertise and talent. What I do not compete with generally are installers.
I don't see this program helping small businesses quite the way it's being marketed.
Were anyone to ask my opinion, I would change the program to providing maintenance services for the elderly who still live in their homes. The need is huge because many of them are on fixed incomes and struggle to cope with leaking pipes, faulty electrical, roofing problems and old fixtures. I would like to see them get a break.