Hassles? You Can Count on It

· Cost for lawyers to try to get my money back for all the rework and to respond to all the contractor's bankruptcies: $47,500 and counting.

· Number of home equity loans I had to take out to pay for all this: 2.

· Number of times I vowed to myself I would never ask my parents to dig into their retirement account to help me pay for redoing the contractor's work in order to make my house livable: 4.

· Number of times I asked anyway: 4.

· Number of licensed tradespeople required for my job: 3.

· Number of licensed tradespeople actually hired by my contractor: 1. (Did that include the electrician or the plumber? No. They were unlicensed.)

· Number of licenses contractor claimed to have: 1.

· Number of contractor's licenses that turned out to be fraudulent: 1.

· Number of days between the day the state revoked the contractor's license (after I fired the company), and the day the contractor started a new company under a different name: 1.

· Number of times the contractor has been arrested on fraud-related charges since I hired the company: 2.

· Number of jurisdictions in which contractor has thus been charged with fraud: 2.

· Number of complaints to the Better Business Bureau, county consumer affairs office or the state regulatory agency that were far enough along for the public to discover prior to my hiring the company: 0.

· Number of children contractor has had since the beginning of my project: 2.

· Number of times contractor has asked me to "think of their children" since the firing: 2.

· Number of times contractor or any subcontractor actually used the portable toilet put on the premises solely for their use: 3.

· Number of times contractors' aim was true when using my brand-new bathroom instead of the portable toilet: 0.

· Number of times strangers driving by stopped to use the portable potty: too many to count.

And yet . . . I agree, as is so often remarked, that renovating is a tad like childbirth. I think once it is over, once I have recouped my money and the sharp sting of contractor betrayal has faded, I might forget all the bad parts and be persuaded to do it again in another house someday.

Just the other day I saw a great-looking faucet at Home Depot.