How do you find a good builder in Sydney? What Reddit says

Reddit's most-repeated renovation question isn't about tiles or benchtops — it's "how do I find a builder I can trust?" Two r/AusRenovation threads, "How do you find a (good) builder?" and "How do you find legit trades?", collect years of hard-won answers. We've summarised them honestly here and checked them against NSW law, as a licensed Sydney builder (Licence 481876C). This page is part of our lessons-from-Reddit roundup.

Reddit's builder-vetting checklist

• Verify the licence yourself with NSW Fair Trading — don't take "we're licensed" on faith. (It's free and takes two minutes.)
• Ask a good tradie who they'd use. Good trades know other good trades — though one commenter warns a recommendation can just mean "they drink together", so still do your checks.
• Prefer industry-association members (Master Builders and similar). Not a guarantee, but as one poster put it, "the dodgy bros are less likely to be a member".
• Treat glowing reviews with caution. Several posters were burned by tradies with perfect Google ratings.
• No cash jobs. Everything in writing. Licences and insurance up front.

The red flags the horror stories share

Across the threads the same warning signs recur: pressure for big cash deposits, no written contract or a vague scope, prices far below every other quote, reluctance to show a licence number, and poor communication during quoting. In NSW some of these aren't just red flags, they're law — a deposit above 10% on a job over $20,000 is non-compliant, and jobs over that threshold require Home Building Compensation cover.

Our take: make the builder prove it

Reddit's checklist is exactly right, and it's why we publish our licence and ABN on every page of this site — so you can verify rather than trust. Our guide to choosing a licensed builder in NSW goes deeper: the contract clauses to insist on, the statutory warranties a compliant builder carries, and the questions that make a dodgy operator walk away before they cost you anything.

A builder who breaks the rules before the contract is signed is showing you exactly how they'll run the build. Believe them the first time.

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Reddit roundup Choosing a builder NSW