Never in my life did I think I’d own a home, but I was fortunate enough to close on my first house last fall. Yet as I moved into my new space—after nearly a decade of renting in New York City—I was overwhelmed with anxiety. Anything and everything that went wrong in the house was now the responsibility of my wife and I to solve. Is something wrong with the boiler? Find someone to fix it. Got water damage? Find someone to fix it, fast.
I’m a little handy around the house. I recently installed a smart thermostat and smart shades, I painted several rooms, and I successfully followed the California patch method to fix some holes in my drywall. Most of these experiences start with me watching several YouTube videos (HomeRenoVision is excellent). But there are a lot of jobs I just don’t feel comfortable doing myself. That’s where Thumbtack comes in.
Photograph: Julian Chokkattu
It’s like the Yellow Pages and Uber mixed into one app built for homeowners, where you can find and hire a professional in your area for nearly anything you need to do in your home. There are vendor reviews from other customers with photos of the completed work, plus you can chat with and book these experts through the app. Thumbtack as a company has been around for more than 15 years, so its database is enormous—there are 300,000 local professionals across the US. Best of all, the app is free; the company charges professionals a matchmaking fee, and it doesn’t place any pressure on you to pay them through its app.
Today, Thumbtack is unveiling a new version that evolves the app from a way to find home professionals into a project manager for your home. I’ve been playing around with the new update over the past week—it’s only rolling out for iPhone right now, with Android to come in a few months—but it’s already giving me a little more peace of mind.
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One Task at a Time
The previous owner of my house left several business cards and leaflets for plumbers, roof specialists, and the like in a few of the drawers. For some of the initial work I wanted help with, I tried Googling the details of these people as well as researching local handymen, but it was hard to get a sense of how much a project would cost if I hired them, and whether or not they’d be reliable. That’s when I remembered it was my home inspector who recommended Thumbtack.
Ever since then, I have used the app several times in the past few months. I’ve hired an electrician to install new outlets and my security cameras. I’ve had some folks come to move and install a washer and dryer, to recaulk baseboards, and even to mount a TV. Thumbtack is built for homeowners, but there are certainly a few things renters will find useful as well, like if you need help assembling furniture, mounting items, or moving.
The app does a great job of auto-filling my queries and pointing me to the terms industry professionals use. Thumbtack’s director of product, Alexis Baird, says the new update also leverages Meta’s Llama 2 large language models to better map your searches to professionals, who may use more precise terms and proper lingo in their profiles to showcase their expertise.
Once you choose a category of work, the app tries to nail down exactly what you’re looking for. I recently had some water damage in my mudroom, so in the app, I searched for water damage, and the app asked me whether I needed someone to assess the damage, restore the area, extract water, dry and dehumidify, and so on. The damage was minimal, and I didn’t need anything extracted, so I selected a few relevant options, identified the cause of the damage, and was given a long list of professionals to contact.
Photograph: Julian Chokkattu
The app really tries to get you to book with a professional right off the bat, and I don’t love this experience. I’d like to speak to them to get a sense of what I can expect, but honestly, my primary reason for not booking someone immediately boiled down to price. I just didn’t know what the expected costs were, and I wanted to see if I could get a rough idea first. Good news! The new update adds pricing estimates for various projects (even seasonal pricing), so you have a clearer picture before even messaging a professional about a ballpark cost.
Home Manager
The best part of the new Thumbtack update, however, is the effort the company put in to make the app more proactive than reactive. You can set a date to receive a reminder to clean the gutters or get recommendations on how often to maintain your appliances—like when you need to flush the water heater. Even better, it uses a label to show you if a certain task is DIY-friendly, in case you want to save some cash and try your hand at some easy maintenance. There are also nuggets of information throughout the interface, like how “caulking and sealing can save up to 10 to 20 percent on energy costs.”
These projects are all assembled under “guides,” each of which has several suggestions. For example, if you want to improve your home’s energy efficiency, you’ll find recommendations on cleaning dryer vents, vacuuming refrigerator coils, and replacing lightbulbs, all with pricing estimates, information on whether these tasks are DIY-friendly, and quick access to professionals if they’re not. Other guides include boosting your home’s curb appeal and other suggestions for increasing your home’s value if you’re looking to sell. You can add these guides to your plan—sort of your master to-do list within the app—and slowly tackle them one at a time.
“We see this as not just a manual or a how-to guide, but a get-it-done solution,” says Marco Zappacosta, Thumbtack’s CEO and cofounder.
Photograph: Julian Chokkattu
Ultimately, it’s the quality of the work that makes me happy with Thumbtack. Every single person I have hired through the app has been professional, performing the task impeccably and swiftly. I could just be really lucky, but I do my best to look at all the reviews and analyze the photos of completed work, and Thumbtack makes it easy to do.
The only thing I would stress, and Thumbtack also does a great job of reinforcing this, is to send your project to multiple professionals. Most folks offer a free estimate (the app indicates if they don’t), so there’s no harm in having a few people come by and give you a quote. It’s how I’ve been able to get the help I need within the constraints of my budget.
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