Ask the Expert columnist Tim Carter suggests that you set up a timely and fair payment plan. Also, get everything in writing and keep records so you can reference it later if you need to.

A trustworthy, professional, financially stable basement contractor can be a huge help to you if you decide to remodel your basement. He will provide important and beneficial advice that can only come from an expert, such as amenities to add to your basement like a bathroom or kitchenette.

Read more about hiring basement contractors here.

Ask your contractor how they train their employees. If it’s trial and error, you may want to find out how many jobs they have done prior to hiring them for yours.

We just ended our three-day system design and installation training at our facility in Connecticut. We had 107 representatives from 39 dealerships who attended to learn how to design and install our basement waterproofing products and systems. We do this particular training three times per year, and a total of 20 trainings on various aspects of the waterproofing, crawl spaces, and basement finishing each year.

I enjoy these trainings a lot as we get to see people from around the the U.S., Canada, and U.K. The Basement Systems dealer network is made up of a great group of people, as since its inception 20 years ago, it has been policy to only recruit the best waterproofing contractors to be dealers, and this always included nice friendly people who would represent the company well.

The training focused on all aspects of designing the most logical and cost-effective custom-tailored system for the home owner using a combination of investigative research including a detailed inspection, an interview with the home owner and our multimedia presentation software, Basement Vision, which shows the transformation of a wet basement into a dry, comfortable, healthy space.