Hired a roofer in Dallas who quoted $8,500, then the real reviews came out
I almost handed a guy $8,500 to fix my roof in Dallas two weeks ago. His Google page had like 40 five-star reviews and everyone gushed about how fast and friendly he was. Then my neighbor told me to check the local Facebook group and Angi instead. Turns out most of those five-star folks were his cousins and church buddies, and there were real complaints buried on other sites about him leaving jobs half done. I called two past customers from the negative reviews and both said the same thing, he ghosts you once he gets the deposit. That whole week taught me more about reading reviews than anything else. Now I look for the 2 and 3 star reviews first, and if there are none at all that is a huge red flag. It saved me from a $8,500 mistake. Does anyone else sort by the worst reviews before trusting a contractor, or is that just me being paranoid?
Sorting by the worst reviews saved me too when I got my fence done last year. Found one guy with nothing but 5 stars and zero bad ones, which felt fishy, so I skipped him. The guy I hired had a few angry reviews about being slow, but they all said his work held up fine, and honestly that matched what I saw.