Getting help with landscaping isn’t limited to planting bushes and flowers; it’s also about hardscaping (patios, walks), placing trees in optimal spots and plotting out your property.
You can work with a landscape architect or designer or a landscaping company to plan or install entire environments (plants, grading, walls and walks). Some garden centers offer landscaping services. You can also DIY.
If you need help, there’s no single answer about whom to hire. Some landscaping companies do everything from paving to planting. Most landscape architects do only designs, meaning you’ll have to use other companies to complete your project, or do the work yourself. To aid your search, access Consumers’ Checkbook’s ratings for landscape designers, lawn care services, garden centers and other local providers free until July 5 via Checkbook.org/WashingtonPost/landscapers.
Here’s what to know before you get started.
Getting ready
Before hiring a landscape pro, consider your space and what you want to do with it, knowing that your plan will evolve. Think about:
- What’s your budget? A few thousand dollars could pay for updating an existing garden but not a complete renovation or hardscaping work.
- Are you going for a theme, such as an English meadow or a Zen meditation garden?
- Do you want to replace everything or preserve and complement what’s already there?
- Do you need hardscaping such as walls, paths or a patio? A new fence, deck or gazebo?
- Do you want to retain or create a large open space for children or pets?
- Do you want plantings that require little maintenance, or are you willing to help keep things up?
- Do you want flowers that will provide constant color? Fruit and vegetable plants?
- Do you want new plantings that create privacy?
- Do you need to solve drainage problems or issues with deer or other garden-chomping critters?
- For inspiration, consult gardening and landscaping websites, magazines, books and social media accounts or walk through your neighborhood.
Selecting design help
Landscaping companies can do both design and installation or provide a plan that you or a pro gardener or hardscaper implements. You can also hire a landscape architect or designer to draw up plans. Some design pros will also supervise the installation.
Show potential designers your property and listen to their ideas — many will offer novel suggestions. Look at their online portfolios or tour spaces they have designed. Talk with previous clients.
Not all landscape designers or landscape installers have expertise in all areas. If you want a stone wall or path, an irrigation system or regrading, seek companies experienced at those tasks.
Get a written agreement with specifics on what the designer will do, including detailed drawings and notes about what will be planted where.
Your role in planning
As the designer’s work progresses, review the plan and give feedback. Specific questions to ask:
How will the plants recommended by the designer fit your tastes and needs? Plants should both look great and suit your property’s soil type, drainage and sunlight exposure. You might discuss suggested plantings with an independent source, such as a master gardener affiliated with an area cooperative extension service.
What will you have to do? If it sounds like too much maintenance, ask for revisions to make the future green thumbing more manageable and affordable.
How large will provided plants be now and when they mature? Discuss how your property will look both right away and years from now. Without good planning, you could find yourself with an assortment of plants that do not complement one another in size, shape or color.
“Fast-growing” isn’t always a desirable trait in landscaping. One trick used by some full-service landscaping companies is to suggest and plant quick-growing varieties that require serious upkeep and trimming, hoping you’ll hire them to do maintenance work.
Choosing and dealing with the installer
Ask potential pros to provide addresses of properties where they have done installations and go look at the work. When you consult companies, get answers to the following questions, and include them in the contract you sign:
- How do you keep things up? Conflicts between landscapers and customers frequently occur when plants die sooner than expected.
- What guarantees do you get? If you do your part but plants die or fail to thrive, will the company provide free replacements? How long are structures guaranteed to last?
- How quickly can work start, and how long will it take?
- Will the company take proper steps to identify and avoid underground utility lines? If a company tells you this is unnecessary, call 811 to confirm.
- Will the landscaper use pesticides or herbicides? If so, what precautions are necessary to prevent harm? If pesticides are to be used, require the company to prove it will use a certified applicator.
- How large a deposit is required? It’s reasonable for companies to require small down payments so they don’t have to front the costs of plantings and other materials. But the power to delay payment until work is done as agreed provides great leverage.
Don’t overpay
Once you have a final landscaping plan, use it to obtain price quotes from multiple installation companies. Get a fixed-price contract for all work and materials.
Shopping around is key: Consumers’ Checkbook’s undercover shoppers found tremendous price variation from company to company for the same work; some companies charged twice what others did for the same tasks.
If you want a landscaper to provide continuing maintenance services, make sure you understand what you’ll get for the price — and what will cost extra.
Supervise
Stay engaged. Once work begins, check in daily. If you have questions or complaints, bring them up. Check plants as they arrive and before they are planted for signs of trouble.
If you do your part but plants don’t thrive, immediately ask the company to inspect them and, if necessary, replace them.
Jennifer Barger is content director at Washington Consumers’ Checkbook and Checkbook.org, a nonprofit organization with a mission to help consumers get the best service and lowest prices. It is supported by consumers and takes no money from the service providers it evaluates. You can access Checkbook’s ratings of local landscapers and all of its other ratings and advice free until July 5 at Checkbook.org/WashingtonPost/landscapers.
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