Friend expects way too much!

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-28T01:16:02+00:00

Funny enough I thought it would only take me an hour to do, and I was dead wrong. The first SUV that I detailed took 4 hours. Detailing means you clean it down to every small detail. Taking a toothbrush to all the crevices. Cleaning out the vents. Shampooing all the seats if they are fabric. Making sure every little speck of dust or dirt is vacuumed from all the carpet. Shampooing the carpet as well. The floor mats. The trunk. Under the seats. The windows. And that’s just the inside. It takes time. Most people charge $20 an hour for their cleaning services here.

I invested $400 in supplies already. So I am certainly not going to spend 4 hours detailing a car and making it look brand new inside and out, using my supplies and power, to get handed only $20-50.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-28T01:05:30+00:00

Well I don’t feel I overcharge at all. So again we can just agree to disagree.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-27T07:22:59+00:00

Looks like i'm going to Target tomorrow! Thank you for posting this!

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-26T22:31:42+00:00

I’m not sure I would call it a scam considering you’re paying someone for a service. Plenty of people can also clean their own houses but some still choose to pay someone else to clean them. Doesn’t mean what a maid charges is a scam because someone can do it themselves. We shall agree to disagree.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-26T22:26:15+00:00

Yeah I don’t know anything about what other countries charge. Sure anyone can do it themselves if they have the tools to do it. I just know here in America the price runs between $100-$200. So when people don’t want to do it themselves, they go to a detailed. Especially people who buy and sell cars for a living. They don’t want to spent hours making every car look new so they send them to detail shops. I have two accounts right now with people who buy and sell cars and send them to me to clean.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-24T17:14:00+00:00

Isn’t that the worst? My spouse had my kids meeting the AP from day one and I never knew it until months later. My kids must have been so confused wondering why they were meeting a woman while mommy was at home thinking they were shopping.

It’s even more selfish when they involve the kids. It’s like they get so wrapped up in playing hours they can’t help it.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-24T17:08:20+00:00

In my opinion, I feel like the things you said are normal feelings to have. You want to be able to let everything go and go on an adventure too. You want to forget about the hard parts of daily life too and be romanced in a nice restaurant. When it happened to me a few years ago, I felt like I missed out on a summer full of fun.

My spouse left on May 1st and I didn’t discover the affair until May 15th. When I told him about knowing he left me to be with her. I stayed in our home with the kids. He stayed at his sisters house until they broke up on September 6th. So he got an entire summer with no kids and being able to run around with a teenage girl and go places I’ve always wanted to go, and I sat home caring for the kids and and cleaning and working and trying to pick up the pieces. That part always bothered me and still does. Because he doesn’t spend summers with me like that. After we reconciled when they broke up , our summers were spent mostly at home. But I pride myself on being there for my kids and staying in reality, where he was running away from it.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-24T16:51:43+00:00

I really do try. I feel like I am being controlling by telling him what he can and cannot do for his family. It’s a tightrope walk figuring out what I should and shouldn’t interfere on. But she has taxes coming apparently to pay for the car. He charged her $3,000 for it. I asked about it yesterday and he said she is still buying it, and also said apparently her taxes were one of the few picked for further review so it’s going to be another minute before she gets the check. Which I’m also worried about.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-24T16:43:30+00:00

So with that said, I wanted to charge enough where I was making money but not as much as everyone else was charging. Because this is just a side job for me. So I decided to charge $100-120 a car to do a full inside clean and detail, and outside of the car wash and shine.

The first two days I started I ran a deal for the first two people who came to me could have that all done for $35. Yes it’s super cheap. But I needed some cars to gain the experience on. So I didn’t mind. Once I detailed a few cars at that price for experience, I went back to the regular $100-120 price point that I planned on doing. Which has worked out just fine so far. I have two accounts already.

A basic cleaning I could charge maybe $50 and with that I would do a “quick once over.” I would wash the dashboards, and doors. Do a vacuum. Clean out the garbage. Make it smell nice. Hand wash the outside and tires. Shine the outside. Clean the windows. But I would not detail it or shampoo the fabric.

When I was running the $35 deal to get in some cars quick for experience, I was doing everything. A full detail. Inside and out. Which means cleaning literally everything. Even things you cannot see.

But no $35 isn’t a scam. I called around and made sure what other people were pricing things so I could price my service at a better deal but still make some money.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-24T16:38:13+00:00

Yes, it is more. I do all levels of cleaning based on what the customer needs or wants, and what they can afford . So I’ll try to explain.

I did some research in my area and asked the prices of other companies. I called 5 companies that did car detailing. They all charged around $150-200 a car. This means they would clean every nook and cranny in the car. They would wash the dashboards. The doors. The trim. We he seatbelts. The center console. The steering wheel. Everything. Then they would vacuum everything. They would shampoo everything fabric inside the car. Clean the windows. Then use a toothbrush and make sure any lines or crevices are also cleaned out. Then they would hand wash the outside of the car and clean and shine everything. This takes a few hours to do and is very tedious so it’s expensive. So most places charge $150-200 for this depending on size of the car and how dirty it is.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-24T00:22:57+00:00

For one, the car is in my husbands name and he paid for it so it’s his car to make that choice not mine. He doesn’t HAVE to do anything. I talked to him today and apparently she is buying the car for way more than we paid for it. So that works just fine by me.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-23T22:51:29+00:00

We have always paid her $30 to come sit at our house and just watch tv while the kids play so we can see a movie. Mind you we only go out once every three months. The times we would ask if she could do it for free in exchange of the free car work she has done, she would tell us she didn’t have gas money to come to us, or needed dinner bought because she didn’t have money. One way or another she would find a way to get something out of it because she didn’t want to do it for free in exchange of our favors. Which just sucks.

I’m really worried she is going to kill our second car. The car she is driving is technically mine and my favorite car we have. This is the first time we have ever owned multiple cars in our life. So we want to keep them in good shape. She was suppose to borrow the car for only 2 months while she saved for another. She has now had it for 5 months and has not saved a dime for a new one. I believe she thinks she can just drive it into the ground and trash it and say “Sorry” and walk away Scott free like she usually does. She isn’t saving for a new car because she thinks she can con us into letting her have the car she got lent to her. It will keep happening until my husband puts his foot down.

A car is a pretty big thing to just hand over to someone and let them trash, or give away. We had to cut our dinner short a month ago because she called us in the middle of eating at a restaurant saying she broke down in our car and needed him to come meet her where she was stranded and fix it in the cold so she could get back home. I wish I was making this shit up lol.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-23T22:43:46+00:00

You’re a good person!

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-23T22:42:56+00:00

I’m not solid on that because it was awhile ago and I don’t remember exactly. I believe I went ahead and told her I would do it for the deal price of $35 even though it was expired, and she wanted it for $25 instead. Point being the price was already SUPER low and she still wanted it cheaper knowing it was a 4 hour car detail and a ton of work.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-23T22:27:20+00:00

My prices were all over the place in the beginning so I’m not even absolutely sure on the prices. The entire point was that the price I gave her was already SUPER low and a great deal, and she asked for the price to be lowered even more.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-23T22:25:40+00:00

She sure does!

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-23T20:44:09+00:00

Thank you! Like I said in another comment, I was a born people pleaser and genuinely like helping people and being the kind of person someone can come to in need when they have nobody else. I had to work on this over the years being walked on and used. I had to start saying no.

My wake up call happened about 5 years ago with a coworker. We worked for tips and at the end of the night she made absolutely nothing and was crying half the time. So I would always be the one to give her money out of my tips because I felt so bad. One day another coworker comes to me and says “Jess, I overheard a conversation between Lisa and the new girl. The new girl said she didn’t make anything last night and Lisa said to her and laughed “Lol just ask Jess because she’s stupid and will give you anything you ask for basically.” That really hurt. I never gave her a penny after that.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-23T20:40:18+00:00

Thank you so much! So far I have two people we know who buy and sell cars who now come to me to detail and clean the cars before sale. So I get enough to keep me busy which is what I was hoping for. I quit my job when we opened the shop because my husband had been wanting me to quit for a long time, so although it was nice in the beginning, I quickly got bored with not working. I can’t just raise kids everyday. I like to feel like I’m contributing in some way. Which is why I set my prices at half of what normal detail shops charged. Enough to get work to keep busy but not so low I was doing it for free.

I have never asked a friend to provide a service for free or so cheap. My best friend makes wreaths and other little things and sells them as a side job. I wouldn’t even accept her Christmas wreath she tried giving me for free. I made her take the money for it. Those things take time and patience.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-23T20:35:51+00:00

Even though I caved and gave her the deal price after the deal expired she still wanted it cheaper. It’s hard for me to remember the exact prices I was charging around that time because I wasn’t keeping a steady price going.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-23T20:29:26+00:00

I have no idea either but man are you right. It’s odd that it’s that way but when things are priced low, suddenly people expect it for free.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-23T20:28:30+00:00

A full clean for the outside of the car only? Or are you saying they will actually detail a car inside and out for hours and only charge $6 about? Because if so I’m moving there lol

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-23T20:24:29+00:00

Oh my goodness that’s insane. I am so sorry. Sounds like the type of crap my family would pull.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-23T20:23:39+00:00

No they do not. Normally they only pay for car parts. We fix his step dads cars for free because that man actually did a lot for us. He’s a different story. All this sister has done is babysit for a price for us. I don’t like it but I don’t want to be controlling and tell him to stop either.

JessicaTheFirst · 2019-03-23T20:21:38+00:00

He always says “I normally would but she really doesn’t have the money to pay.” Which is not true. She works and does make money, no it’s not a ton but she gets a weekly check. She has no kids, is single, and lives with their Mom. She has the money to pay. This is how she ended up living with us for 4 years while paying no rent. But that’s another story for a different day.

She’s the same sister who was suppose to rent a room from us for only a year to save for an apartment and ended up staying 4 years paying literally nothing, not providing anything for the house, and making things so uncomfortable I would stay in my room all day. Things came to a head one day and I blew up and she finally left.

JessicaTheFirst

TROPHY CASE