Pre-bid client check · residential trades

Check a client
before you bid.

The moment a contractor signs a contract is the moment your materials, your crew, and your margin are on the line — and only an outside check on the client tells you whether that bid was worth the call. TradeSafeJobs pulls the payment risk and the property/legal risk on a homeowner or GC into one read.

Already worked with this client? Submit your experience →

Trades covered
Kitchen-bath · Deck · Flooring
Categories checked
Payment · Property · Legal
Deliverable
Single Go / Caution / No-Go
Pre-bid verdict · sample
The Halverson Trust
4218 W Maplewood Dr, Kansas City · MO · scoped for a kitchen-bath remodel
Caution

Unpaid invoices on file

Flagged

State contractor board · complaints index

Open mechanics liens

Clear

County recorder (statewide index)

Collections history

Flagged

Aggregated small-dollar lien filings

Prior-contractor payment timing

Clear

Cross-vendor payment-timing index

8 of 8 signals checkedSingle verdict: Caution

A signed proposal cannot answer

How it works

Three steps. One pre-bid verdict.

Built for the moment a contractor is about to commit a crew and a materials drop — not the moment non-payment hits the books.

  1. 01

    Hand over the client and the property

    A homeowner, a trust, an LLC, or the GC’s name on the bid. Add the property address so ownership and permit history match to a parcel, not just a name.

  2. 02

    We pull the signals directly from the source

    County recorders, contractor licensing boards, surety registries, court dockets, and public-records aggregators — not a self-attested reference letter or a credit app.

  3. 03

    You get a single Go / Caution / No-Go

    One verification read with the source for every check. Two categories — payment and property/legal — collapsed into the verdict that decides whether you bid.

Sample pre-bid verdict

Two categories. One verdict.

Payment risk and property/legal risk are checked independently and combined into a single Go / Caution / No-Go. Every line carries the source it was pulled from.

  • Unpaid invoices on file
  • Open mechanics liens
  • Collections history
  • Prior-contractor payment timing
  • Property ownership verified
  • Active litigation
  • Prior-contractor disputes
  • Permit & inspection track record
Pre-bid verdict · sample
The Halverson Trust
4218 W Maplewood Dr, Kansas City · MO · scoped for a kitchen-bath remodel
Caution

Mixed signals — review each flagged item and clarify payment terms before signing.

Payment risk

  • Unpaid invoices on file

    Flagged

    2 complaints reported to the state contractor board in the last 24 months — both under $4k.

    State contractor board · complaints index

  • Open mechanics liens

    Clear

    No active liens against the property from prior trades.

    County recorder (statewide index)

  • Collections history

    Flagged

    1 account in collections naming the homeowner entity — under $800, current status disputed.

    Aggregated small-dollar lien filings

  • Prior-contractor payment timing

    Clear

    Average 41 days between job completion and final payment on comparable remodels.

    Cross-vendor payment-timing index

Property & legal risk

  • Property ownership verified

    Clear

    Deed of record matches the named client entity. No transfers in the last 12 months.

    County recorder · deed index

  • Active litigation

    Clear

    No open civil cases naming the homeowner entity or the property address in the last 36 months.

    State court docket (last 36 months)

  • Prior-contractor disputes

    Flagged

    1 mediation case resolved with no payout in 2023 — kitchen remodel, scope change at the source.

    State contractor board · dispute log

  • Permit & inspection track record

    Flagged

    1 expired permit on the parcel from a prior deck job — closed by inspection last quarter.

    County permit office

8 of 8 signals checkedSingle verdict: Caution

Who it protects

The contract is yours. The bid risk should be yours too — not a surprise.

Three residential verticals where non-payment costs more than the job:

Kitchen-bath remodel
Bid the $40k kitchen with the lien record in hand.

The deposit structure on a kitchen remodel covers materials. The remainder is performance risk on the homeowner. We pull prior-contractor complaints, payments splits, and any open lien on the parcel before you commit the install crew.

Deck
Verify parcel ownership before the lumber drop.

A deck bid is small enough to take on a handshake and large enough to write off when the homeowner disappears mid-project. The report pulls parcel ownership, expired-permit history, and any active litigation on the address — so the lumber order is not the moment you find out.

Flooring
Run payment timing before the materials PO.

Flooring contracts turn on material cost — the order is the irretrievable spend. Cross-vendor payment timing on comparable jobs and any small-dollar collections naming the homeowner entity let you step off a tight-margin bid before the pallet ships.

“For a decade I have watched good contractors lose a season’s margin to a single client who never intended to pay the second draw. The signals were already public — there just was no one putting them in front of the bid, in the language a contractor actually uses.”
Patrick C. FitzgeraldFounder, TradeSafeJobsOwner, Epik Construction LLC (Missouri, since 2012)

FAQ

The questions a signed proposal cannot answer.

Pre-bid check

Run a check on your next bid.

Paste in the homeowner or GC’s name and the property address. Get a single Go / Caution / No-Go verdict plus the source for every line — before the materials commit, not after.