Ventanas

We are in the perfect neighborhood for those door-to-door men trying to sell everything from new windows and sidings to driveways and lawn care. You name it, they try to sell it to us.

A few months back we were propositioned to have a new driveway poured. A lot of our neighbors seemed to have one company laying black top for them and so they were going door to door to see how much more business they could get. They had their trucks out and materials and said they could offer us an "amazing deal!" if we did it that day. I believe it was like a $3,000 job. I was amazed that these people seriously thought we'd just go for it... but I guess some people have 3 grand (or a credit card) just laying around for those random purchases.

Either way, it never happened. So, yesterday when I was bumming around the house, there was a knock on the door. It was someone from Power Windows and Siding offering to give us a free estimate on our windows. I told them we didn't have the money for it now hoping they'd leave me a lone, but they didn't. He told me that they quote was good for X amount of time and that it was no hassle, etc.

Not having the heart to say no (he seemed like a nice enough guy) I told him he was more then welcome to come up with a quote. At that point he explains that he doesn't do the quote, he has to send someone out (ugh.). So, I agreed and told him that night was my only free time in the next week or so. He gets someone on the line and makes the arrangements. Ryan of course was "thrilled".

Now, our house is in desperate need of new windows, siding, doors, etc. It's old and inefficient. When the gentleman came out he said that the smartest place to start is windows. It wouldn't mess up any of our interior walls (one of my biggest concerns) and it's cheaper than siding (and saves more in energy bills). In addition, the windows go in from outside and so they trim, sills, etc would all stay in tact). He gave us the full scoop, discussed style options, got measurements and presented us with a number. OUCH.

It wasn't as high as we'd expected and with the payment option, it was totally reasonable. But of course, he wanted an answer that night. Seriously? Someone knocked on my door that afternoon, came to our house a matter of hours later and expected us to make a decision to buy windows in less than 24 hours. The biggest perk is that they guarantee something like a 30% saving on energy bills once they're installed... I mean when you calculate that into the monthly payments... it's even more reasonable.

We didn't give them an answer... and probably won't be doing it in January like they were pushing for, but we're happy to see that new windows (and eventually siding) are not as far off as we'd expected. Perhaps within the next year or two we'll start to transformation on the outside of our house.