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Launch HN: HomeBreeze (YC W21) – Easy booking of home repairs

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Re: Launch HN: HomeBreeze (YC W21) – Easy booking of home repairs

#71

Post by brudgers »

vm wrote: post #63
brudgers wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The market is efficient. Good contractors have good clients and work on good jobs. They have B2B business relationships. It is a two sided market for lemons. The contractors are mostly contacted by lemon customers. Mostly lemon contractors are likely to respond. What makes homeowners lemon customers besides price sensitivity and non-repeating projects is inexperience. Construction scheduling is in NP. Professionals s…

Interesting... HomeBreeze has quickly become an important B2B relationship for the home pros we work with. Although a lot of what you're describing is for construction, which we don't serve, your comment makes me think that we could be giving homeowners access to great contractors who they wouldn't be able to otherwise access.

Installing water heaters is, as you know, construction.

Giving homeowners access to average contractors is a step up. Hard times are the measure of relationships.

In your case it will be when you have to choose one side of the market’s interests over the other.

Ultimately, vetting of customers is necessary. That’s equilibrium. The supply of sweet lemons is limited.

Re: Launch HN: HomeBreeze (YC W21) – Easy booking of home repairs

#72

Post by brudgers »

sjg007 wrote: post #66
brudgers wrote: post #53

What is in it for contractors? Or to put it another way, what evidence do you have that the market is inefficient? Or to put it another another way, how will you overcome the fundamental economic rational actor motivation? Qualified tradespeople will prioritize: repeat customers such as real estate companies and landlords; large jobs over small; and high paying work over guaranteed affordable prices. The best tradesp…

>The home repair market is a market for lemons I thought a good idea would be home owner insurance that provides vetted contractors. So vertical integration.

Home owners insurance claims are often fulfilled by vetted contractors. It is another non-lemon sink that increases the ratio of lemons in the open market for homeowners.

Re: Launch HN: HomeBreeze (YC W21) – Easy booking of home repairs

#74

Post by vm »

brudgers wrote: post #53

What is in it for contractors? Or to put it another way, what evidence do you have that the market is inefficient? Or to put it another another way, how will you overcome the fundamental economic rational actor motivation? Qualified tradespeople will prioritize: repeat customers such as real estate companies and landlords; large jobs over small; and high paying work over guaranteed affordable prices. The best tradesp…

For tradespeople we're a high value, repeat client. Similar to a large landlord.

Re: Launch HN: HomeBreeze (YC W21) – Easy booking of home repairs

#76

Post by brudgers »

version_five wrote: post #70
brudgers wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The market is efficient. Good contractors have good clients and work on good jobs. They have B2B business relationships. It is a two sided market for lemons. The contractors are mostly contacted by lemon customers. Mostly lemon contractors are likely to respond. What makes homeowners lemon customers besides price sensitivity and non-repeating projects is inexperience. Construction scheduling is in NP. Professionals s…

This is basically a better version of what I came here to say. I worked in a family construction business, and my perspective / experiencr is that good, established contractors do no advertising and have years of backlog (at least for custom homes or major renovations). I like how you define two markets, that's how I have seen it. There are people that are looking for quality and have the experience to know what to l…

Home Depot and Lowe’s already offer service in the market segment. They advertise fixed prices but their affiliates don’t take on projects with unusual conditions. And sometimes never provide a quote because they are busy.

There is always an unmet demand for below market rate services. Always a demand for work with infeasible economics.

The construction market is highly efficient. Competitive bidding is normative.

Re: Launch HN: HomeBreeze (YC W21) – Easy booking of home repairs

#77

Post by mike210 »

Hi guys - glad to see this! I agree it's a huge problem and one that I've felt several times.

The reason why I never book on TaskRabbit or Thumbtack anymore is because there's legitimately an 80% chance that they don't show up. There's no penalty for not showing up or expressing higher availability and just choosing from it.

This means that every repair or home service that I consider is a simple question. Is this worth rebooking multiple times or will I just bite the bullet and try to do it myself.

I would be willing to pay around 1.5 - 2X more than I book for if I had some guarantee - financial or otherwise, that they would show up. Just the ability to construct a simple equation in my head - "is this repair worth $X" in my head without trying to manage the cost of a no-show would be huge and would have me checking the cost of much more small repairs.

Re: Launch HN: HomeBreeze (YC W21) – Easy booking of home repairs

#78

Post by [deleted] »

brudgers wrote: post #76
version_five wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is basically a better version of what I came here to say. I worked in a family construction business, and my perspective / experiencr is that good, established contractors do no advertising and have years of backlog (at least for custom homes or major renovations). I like how you define two markets, that's how I have seen it. There are people that are looking for quality and have the experience to know what to l…

Home Depot and Lowe’s already offer service in the market segment. They advertise fixed prices but their affiliates don’t take on projects with unusual conditions. And sometimes never provide a quote because they are busy. There is always an unmet demand for below market rate services. Always a demand for work with infeasible economics. The construction market is highly efficient. Competitive bidding is normative.

[deleted]

Re: Launch HN: HomeBreeze (YC W21) – Easy booking of home repairs

#79

Post by DavidSafai »

maxdjacobson wrote: post #42

I (American) started an extremely similar VC-backed business in Germany. We were focused on car maintenance and detailing, but otherwise we had the same business model that you describe: our major selling point was upfront, fixed pricing without a diagnostic appointed, supplied by a network of independent mechanics and backed by a guarantee. We also had a sister company who focused on home services, although their in…

Were you able to raise VC money easily for this? I have created this concept here - HomeLux.ai where the idea is to bring all the people in-house

Re: Launch HN: HomeBreeze (YC W21) – Easy booking of home repairs

#80

Post by vm »

mike210 wrote: post #77

Hi guys - glad to see this! I agree it's a huge problem and one that I've felt several times. The reason why I never book on TaskRabbit or Thumbtack anymore is because there's legitimately an 80% chance that they don't show up. There's no penalty for not showing up or expressing higher availability and just choosing from it. This means that every repair or home service that I consider is a simple question. Is this wo…

Wow that's a high no-show rate! We're major repeat customers for home pros, which gets our jobs prioritized and ultimately gives our homeowner clients great service. Today we don't charge homeowners a premium like that but it's great to know you value the service so highly
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