Pat in Toronto

Troy is excellent. He came to my house in late September to determine how squirrels were accessing my attic, and to remove them. He quickly and thoroughly inspected the roof perimeter and eves. It was discovered that our builder had left an unfinished opening at the corner of one of the gables. He attached a one-way door and told me to monitor the situation, but that very soon, any squirrels still inside would have exited, and to have him back to remove the door/seal the opening before the snow falls. Sure enough, within a few days we heard no more foot steps in the attic, saw no more fibreglass insulation strewn around the front of the house, and were happy to have the problem solved. In mid-November I finally remembered to call him back to seal the hole. Within one hour of calling him, he was able to stop by, remove the door and seal it. Then ..... nice guy that he is, Troy was nice enough to replace 7 burned out bulbs in two of my porch lamps, which require the use of a 32-foot extension ladder. I do not own such a ladder. He did that for me without charge. Nice guy, punctual, knowledgeable, efficient, and very good at what he does. If you have pest problems, call these guys.

We needed a good electrician for a very small job on short notice. I searched HomeStars for a company with a 10 rating and enough reviews for that rating to be reliable. Once again, HomeStars demonstrated its value. We had a downspout coil installed this year to prevent the freezing and clogging of our downspout during the cold months. With no outside AC outlet near it, it was obvious that it would be necessary to run the power cord through the outside wall into our mudroom off the garage. But THAT room had no existing outlet either. I figured that I would drill the wall penetration myself and feed the plug through, if Java could provide an outlet. Laureano, from Java Electric, was able to stop by the same day to give me an estimate. He was even able to do the work later that day, but my schedule made it necessary to plan for the following week. He and his assistant were punctual and professional. He explained how he could remove the coil terminal and make a much smaller wall penetration than I had been planning but removing the male plug, seal up the hole around the cord, attach a new male plug once the cord was inside the mud room, and make it look much less conspicuous. They worked fast, stuck to their estimate, and overall left me very satisfied. I can't think of anything that could have been done better. I would highly recommend them.

After months of struggling to keep on top of the housework at our new home, we found LUX on-line and arranged for the owner, Allan, to come over for an initial meeting and assessment. Admittedly, my wife and I have always been somewhat skeptical about using a cleaning service after hearing so many unpleasant stories from family and friends which usually include complaints about reliability and the inevitable deterioration in the quality of work. As a couple of “neat freaks”, we were immediately impressed that Al took time to go through our home room-by-room, asked very detailed questions in an effort to better understand our priorities, and was able to provide good answers to our probing questions about how they would care for the marble and hardwood floors, and clean those hard-to-reach nooks and crannies. Al then sent us a proposal which included an outline for a one-time "detail" cleaning followed by a schedule for "maintenance" cleanings every two weeks thereafter. We were thrilled with the sparkling results of the “detail” cleaning. No complaints, no damage to my A/V equipment, which I have never trusted anyone else to touch, much less clean. The 10-person team was punctual, polite, professional, and very hardworking. Sara, the team leader was excellent and quite conscientious; she made sure all items on the comprehensive list were addressed and kept things running like clockwork. She then gave us a tour of all they had done, before leaving for the day. Every room was thoroughly cleaned from top to bottom - the light fixtures gleam and the baseboards are spotless. They even managed to find some of the dried slobber our dog had slung onto the most unlikely spots. So impressed were we with the quality of work and the management skills of Sara, the team leader, that we requested that she be part of the 2-person team assigned to our bi-weekly maintenance cleanings. If that wasn’t enough, when she came for our first maintenance cleaning, she demonstrated her skill and expertise in dealing very effectively with our 160-pound, 16 month-old, very curious dog. The quality and attention to detail LUX offers is truly impressive. It emanates from the top down. The owner, Al, struck us as a perfectionist himself. He gives each client his personal attention, provides a comprehensive training course to every employee, and finds talented team leaders. In short, he set out to build a better mousetrap, and did it. I can usually find things to criticize. Not this time. I give LUX the strongest possible endorsement.