by Jason Morris

CORAL GABLES (CBS4) ― Remodeling your home can be noisy, messy and overwhelming. For Coral Gables homeowner Luis Bared, hiring the right contractors meant trusting them with remodeling his front and back yard.

“I did some homework. I don’t hire people off the street,” said Bared.

That homework brought him to servicemagic.com, a website which connects homeowners with what it considers reliable contractors and service professionals. To be listed on the site, they pay referral fees.

But that company advertises that it is now going an extra step forward — make that ten extra steps.

Servicemagic.com claims it conducts a ten point screening process.

“Which includes verification of state-level licensing, general liability insurance, and we run a background check on the business,” said CEO Craig Smith.

We checked out the site and found out they only check licensing at the state level, not at the local level.

Even service Magic’s CEO urges, “it’s still important that the professional produces a copy of their insurance and verification of their license.”

Omar Cabrera knows home improvement. He manages the pro desk at the Pinecrest Home Depot. He says that a criminal background check would be very important.

“If they can go to that extent, it would be incredibly instrumental,” said Cabrera.

Most home improvement companies, like Lowes and Home Depot, do background checks on their own contractors, and knowing that is important to Cabrera.

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