Landscaping can improve the value, usefulness, and beauty of your residential or commercial property. According to Insurance Bee, the landscaping services industry in the United States has grown to a market size of over $100 billion over the last five years. Consequently, it contains over half a million landscaping businesses with over a million employees. If you are looking to hire a contractor, here are five questions to ask a prospective landscape service.

1. Which Services Do You Provide?

A landscape service might specialize in just one area, such as lawn maintenance. Others might provide landscape construction and maybe even landscape design services. The more services one contractor offers, the fewer contractors you might need to complete your landscaping project.

2. What Kind of Equipment Would You Use?

You should get a good idea of the types of equipment and landscaping tools that a contractor might use. Some equipment might be large and heavy to accomplish certain tasks. Others might be mostly hand tools, which cut down on potential noise but might greatly increase the labor cost. Knowing which types of equipment would be used can help you to understand better which contractor is a good choice.

3. Where Would You Get the Supplies?

A local landscape service can help to reduce costs and the potential environmental impact of your project by sourcing needed items locally. Trees, shrubs, and flowering plants often can be grown at a local nursery. Sand, gravel, and topsoil also could be sourced locally, which helps to reduce costs and lessen the environmental impact of your project.

4. What’s the Estimated Cost and Time?

You certainly should know the cost and how long the landscape service would take to fulfill the contract. Granted, weather and other factors might delay project completion. Yet, an experienced landscaping service should have a very good idea of the cost and time it would take to complete in good weather.

5. Are You Insured?

When you turn your property over to a landscape service, it undergoes significant changes. The tools and equipment used to make those changes might result in some sort of accidental catastrophic event, like damaging a natural gas line that catches fire. The contractor should have sufficient commercial liability insurance protection to protect your property. The insurance also could protect you if a worker is injured and wants to sue the property owner.

To learn more about our landscape services, call Thomas J. Costello Landscaping LLC today. Free estimates are available. We look forward to hearing from you!