Our contractor stopped by the house today to deliver his final bill for the siding work. It was supposed to be cheaper than his estimate, since we decided to cover the existing siding rather than having it torn off. However, I opened the envelope and discovered that it was about $1400 MORE than he had estimated. I was furious. I called him to ask what happened, and he said, "I dunno. I guess that's what it cost us." Looking over the breakdown, it appears that he is trying to mark-up the labor for his subs by another 100%, so that's about $700 worth of the overage.  read more »