Cathy in Toronto

We found The Toronto Plumber on Homestars and hired Alex to come unclog our kitchen sink. He came over within a few hours of the call and noticed that the current pipe setup was incorrectly installed. The incorrect installation would not allow for the pipes to even be snaked to get at the clog. He recommended a proper fix of replacing the sections that were incorrect, and was then also able to snake out our clogged pipes (clog was further down past the part he cut out). Very satisfied with Alex's services - he's very punctual, communication was excellent, and was able to quickly fix our clogged drain and gave us a properly configured pipe setup - all within 2 hours. Very transparent with his fees as well and only provided a quote until after he'd physically taken a look at the issue. Will definitely be calling Alex again for any future plumbing issues.

We called a few companies for quotes and as soon as we spoke with John, we felt really comfortable and confident to proceed with AHS. We had AHS build a retaining wall, a portion of new steps, 2 mulch flowerbeds (plants not included), and a small path going across the front yard. John and his crew were really nice to work with, professional, finished within the timeframe as originally promised, and left the area tidy after each evening. We are really happy with the results and we have been receiving many compliments on the stonework. Thanks John & Crew. We wouldn't hesitate to call you again for any future work.

Our fridge and freezer suddenly stopped cooling one day, and so we called a few appliance repair places. Peter was very quick to respond, and although he could not come out that same day, he provided suggestions of what we could try in the mean-time to rule out possibilities of what the issue may be. Based on what I told him, he had a guess of what may be wrong and said that he could order the parts for the next day. Peter came by the next afternoon and quickly diagnosed that it needed a new relay. When installing it, he also noticed a patch of ice build up on the outside back wall of the freezer, which may have had a hand in causing the unit to not cool properly (ice was causing vents to become blocked). He wasn't sure if changing the relay would ultimately fix the issue, but suggested that we try unplugging the unit for 24 hours to let the ice defrost, and see how it goes. If the unit was still not cooling after that, he said he could come back to see what else may be causing the problem. Unplugging it for 24 hours, and switching out the relay did the trick - it's been over a month since we had it fixed and the unit works great. Thanks Peter!!!

We are currently re-finishing our basement, and during construction, our contractors found areas of the floor wet - they dug it out and found that the sewer pipe was cracked. We found Strong Plumbing on Homestars and gave Val a call. He came out to take a look within 1.5 hours of me calling him. Due to the age of our house, he said that there were most likely cracks further along the clay pipe and he recommended that the best solution was to replace the entire length of the sewer pipe from the bottom of the soil stack all the way to the front of the house close to where it would meet the city's pipes. While they were here anyway, we also had them install a drain by the furnace connecting to the main sewer pipe, as well as a back water valve. We found his quote to be very reasonable, given what needed to be done. Val had his crew (Dennis + 2 others) come out at 8am the next morning and video inspected the length of the pipe. And as was suspected, it was cracked in a few more places and had tree roots in some other areas of it as well. They used what they call a Torpedo to take out the old pipe to replace it with the new pipe (minimizes the amount of floor being dug up). They finished everything in 2 days (including re-cementing the floors) and left everything very tidy and clean. These guys are definitely our new "go-to" plumbers and we would not hesitate to recommend them to anyone.

After looking for a few siding contractors, we found Tony/Westwood Aluminum on Homestars. We called him up and he came by within a few days to provide a very reasonable quote. The addition to the back of the house is about 7'x7'. The main reason we were looking to re-side the addition was because we suspected carpenter ants were living within the walls, so we wanted to tear out the old siding to see what we could find and at the same time re-insulate it because it gets quite cold in the winter. We already had an exterminator come by previously to spray over the weekend and Tony's crew (Ned and Josip) came by yesterday and today to do the insulation and siding. When Ned and Josip started to tear off the siding and some of the older foam insulation, we discovered that a colony of carpenter ants were living within our walls and that parts of the frame were badly rotted and eaten away (moisture had gotten in under our window due to a bad job on sealing the window from another contractor). Luckily, our exterminator was able to come by within 10mins and spray the nest. Afterwards, Ned and Josip removed all of the rotten wood and ended up building/replacing the rotten part of the frame for minimal cost. We weren't expecting the damage to the frame, and thought that we were going to need to call another contractor to come in and fix the frame. We were extremely fortunate that Josip and Ned knew how to fix it on the spot, and that they didn't even make a fuss over the nest of ants or having the extra work of replacing the frame. They just finished the work today - the job looks phenomenal, and the area was left totally spotless! Tony and his crew (Ned & Josip) were really great to work with and we are very lucky to have found an honest and reliable company/contractors. They came by when they said they would, their quote was extremely reasonable, they are very friendly, and they went above and beyond what we expected them to do. Needless to say, we are very satisfied with them and we would highly recommend them to anyone! Thank-you Tony, Ned and Josip!!

We found Kevin/GTA Wildlife Removal and Pest Control on Homestars. We read the reviews and thought that this should be the company to call to deal with our Carpenter ant problem - and are we ever glad that we did. We called Kevin last week to help us get rid of a Carpenter ant problem, and mentioned that we would be re-siding the laundry room where we suspected the ants to be living. He sprayed all inside the house and outside of the house this past Saturday and said that when the siding contractors come, let him know and he could be on standby if we ended up finding a nest of ants - he has a warranty of up to one year - if we ever find them again, he will come back and re-spray free of charge. Today we had our siding contractors come in, and lo and behold we definitely found the nest of carpenter ants living in our wall - there must have been several hundred of them + hundreds of eggs/larvae. I called Kevin right away (didn't even tell him in advance of when the siding contractors were coming) and he postponed a job and was back at our house in less than 10 minutes to re-spray the permethrin where the ants were, as well as the perimeter of the house again. Now, all I see are dead ants everywhere outside :) I think he definitely got the entire satellite colony today - which gives me a total sigh of relief. He reassured me that seeing all the ants today and finding the nest was in fact a good thing (although, i was panicking quite a bit at the time to see almost 1000 ants+eggs), because now that the nest has been destroyed and house/perimeter re-sprayed, they are most likely not coming back into our home. I also know that he would come back again if we see any more ants within the year. Kevin, we couldn't thank you enough for coming by on such extreme short notice! We wouldn't have known what to do had you not dropped by today. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!! We would definitely recommend Kevin - he truly stands by his work and we really appreciate the work he has done. Cathy & Joe