- 5 October, 2005 -

After growing up in a family that enjoyed fixing up its home, Melynda Steward carried on the "fix-it-up" attitude when she bought her own home. Thus, the Shawnee resident had a lot of experience, and a lot of frustration, in the area of home improvements. "I do a lot of home improvements in my own home, both by myself and hiring out," Steward said. "I realized that there was a lot of room for improvement in the areas of showing up on time and charging for the job." Which is why Steward discovered a perfect new business to set up in Maintenance Made Simple, a national franchise that provides reliable, experience4d home repair professionals in any trade with a strict, hourly charge, who will arrive at a home at a specific time, not sometime within a three or four hour time period. Steward said repairmen and workers are local plumbers, carpenters, landscapers, roofers and electricians who agree to work for the company. They are carefully screened before being accepted into the company, Steward said, and they must have 10 years of experience. "If I wouldn't have them working on my home, I won't use them," Steward said. A wide variety of services can be ordered through the company, including installing cabinets, decks, flooring and stairways, as well as exterior painting and lawn and tree maintenance. No matter what the service, however, the charge is $65 an hour, and customers will be charged only for the amount of time it actually takes to get the job done, not an estimated job time. If materials are needed, the company can provide them at cost, the customer can supply them or the customer can order the materials and the company can pick them up. The business also carries a limited one-year warranty on all work that is performed and on all materials purchased. Steward said all of this added up to a great service that solved a lot of problems homeowners have when making home improvements. Only one other franchise is in the Kansas City area, a location in Overland Park that opened in January 2005 and was set up to serve mainly southern Johnson County. By setting up her own office in Shawnee, Steward will serve the northern half of the county as well as customers in Wyandotte County. To make an appointment for a service, customers call a national call center, and the information goes back to the local franchise to figure out the logistics. "Some people are intimidated by calling the toll-free number, but it really gets you back to the local office," Steward said. For a complete list of Maintenance Made Simple's services or to schedule and appointment, visit www.m2simple.com or call 1-866-373-7247.

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