Handyman Carpentry in Lake County, IL

Knowing where the line is saves you money and keeps the work right.

New electrical circuits, panel work or anything being run rather than swapped goes to an electrician. A fixture change in an existing box is a swap. A new run is not.

Gas of any kind goes to the gas utility or a licensed plumber. We do not cut, cap or crimp a gas line under any circumstances.

Plumbing inside the wall or under the slab. Swapping a faucet on existing connections is fine. Repiping, moving a supply line or anything involving a soldered joint is a plumber's job.

Anything structural. Removing or altering a load-bearing wall, header work, or a repair where the framing itself is compromised needs an engineer's sign-off before anyone touches it.

HVAC beyond a filter change.

Roofing. The roof and everything fixed to it belongs to a roofer.

We will tell you at the walk which of these your list contains. Most lists are entirely ours. When one item is not, you get a straight answer rather than a bodge.

What is on the list changes a lot depending on when the house was built, and it changes how long each item takes.

Pre-war housing through Evanston, Wilmette, Kenilworth, Winnetka, Highland Park and the older streets of Libertyville and Waukegan means plaster rather than drywall, original trim profiles that are not on any shelf, doors that have moved with a century of settling, and hardware that was made before standard sizing. Almost nothing is a straight swap. Matching matters more than replacing.

Post-war through the seventies across Waukegan, North Chicago, Zion, Skokie and Mundelein is more standardised and generally faster. Hollow-core doors, simpler profiles, drywall.

Newer subdivisions in Gurnee, Round Lake, Lindenhurst, Antioch and Glenview bring builder-grade everything, which means a lot of the list is upgrading rather than repairing — better hardware, anchored shelving where there was none, and fixing what was installed quickly the first time.

Tell us roughly when the house was built along with the list. It changes the estimate more than the number of items does.

Two quotes on the same job can differ by half, and it is almost never because one is greedy. It is because they are describing different work. These are the questions that make them comparable.

Is it a per-item price or a time block? Both are used. A half or full day for a punch list is usually better value than pricing eleven small items individually, because the trip and setup dominate.

Who supplies parts? Have them on site if you care about the look. Otherwise confirm whether they are marked up or billed at cost.

What happens if an item turns out bigger than it looked? Soft wood behind trim, a door that has moved rather than sagged. You should hear about it before the work happens.

What is outside scope? New electrical runs, gas, in-wall plumbing and anything structural go to the licensed trades. A quote that promises all of it should make you cautious rather than relieved.

Minimum charge. Ask. Most trades have one and it is better known in advance.

Carpentry has its own vocabulary and most of it is never explained to the person paying for the work. Here is what the terms on your estimate actually mean.

Cope. An inside corner cut where one piece is scribed to the profile of the other rather than both being cut at 45 degrees. Coped joints stay closed as a house moves through the seasons. Mitred inside corners open up. It is the single clearest tell of finish carpentry versus trim installation.

Scribe. Cutting a piece to follow the actual shape of a wall, floor or ceiling instead of assuming it is straight. Nothing in a house is straight, and scribing is what makes work sit tight against reality.

Reveal. The small deliberate setback where casing meets a door jamb, usually about a quarter inch. It gives the eye a line and hides the fact that the jamb edge is never perfectly flush. Zero reveal looks like a mistake.

Spring angle. The angle at which crown molding sits between wall and ceiling. It determines every cut on the run, and it changes on a vaulted or angled ceiling — which is why those get set off the actual ceiling rather than a chart.

Built-up. A profile assembled from several stock pieces to make a larger or more complex shape than any single piece offers. It is how original profiles in older houses get matched when the exact moulding is no longer made.

Shim. A thin tapered wedge used to bring something to plumb or level in an opening that is neither. Every door hung in an older house depends on them.

Blocking. Extra framing added inside a wall so something can be anchored to it later — a grab bar, a floating shelf, a heavy mirror, a wall-hung vanity. Cheap while the wall is open, expensive afterwards.

Plumb, level, square. Vertical, horizontal, and at right angles. Three separate things, and in an older house you often cannot have all three at once. Deciding which one to hold is a judgement call.

Face frame. The flat frame on the front of a cabinet carcase that the doors mount to. Frameless cabinets do without it, which is a different look and a different install.

Filler and scribe moulding. The narrow pieces that close the gap between a cabinet run and a wall that is not straight. They are what makes an installation look built in rather than pushed into place.

Jamb. The frame a door sits in. On exterior doors it is usually where the rot is, and replacing the slab without the jamb often solves nothing.

Stringer, tread, riser. The angled board carrying a staircase, the part you step on, and the vertical face between steps. Squeaks come from those three moving against each other.