Another BIG day on trees & demolition

I received a phone call from Jemena yesterday to inform me that the contracting company has our job booked in for January 8. It is a little more complicated in that Ausgrid needs to be present because mains power is involved. Demolition of the house therefore cannot occur until Wednesday.

I received a phone call from the tree lopping company contracted to do the job last night quoting me $5k to do the job of removing all vegetation & stump grinding. Aargh! No way! Told him that I couldn't pay that on top of the $15K demo job especially when the quote says that it includes removal of all shrubs, bushes & trees (with an extra charge to take trees from the site). The lovely man Simon rang back at 9pm to lower the quote to $3700 which still was not acceptable to me. He really wanted the job and was prepared to do it on Saturday. I explained that I had a trusted CHEAP tree lopper that I was going to get a quote from.  I SMSed Jeff straight after and we organised for him to quote today.  After a false start (read he didn't meet me at arranged time due to a doctors appointment), he walked through the property while I was on the other end of the line. I could tell that Jeff really didn't want to do the job (HUGE). Said the tell the other company that he would do it for $3300. Jeff also suggested that we get rid of the palm tree that we were planning on keeping - they are bad news. Called Simon who is going to do the job for $3500 including palm removal.
At some stage, I need to nut out this terrible quote with State Demolition. After losing sleep over the past few nights about this, we might wait until after my holidays.
Be wary of cheap quotes, I say!!