The questions you'd ask if you sat down with us for coffee.

Contract Link is independent contractor-quote review and project brokerage for homeowners in Kitchener, Waterloo, Cambridge, and Guelph. We read contractor quotes before homeowners sign them, score them against our Master Risk Engine, and on larger jobs we run the entire build end-to-end as an independent project broker. The longer story is on the About page →

No, and that's intentional. We are independent advisors and brokers, not the trades doing the physical work. Our value is the read on the quote, the scope discipline, and the project oversight — not swinging the hammer. On brokered projects we work with vetted licensed trades from our Preferred Contractor Network.

Referral sites are paid by contractors — every lead they send costs the contractor money, which gets passed back to homeowners in the quote. We are paid by homeowners. That single structural difference changes who the analysis serves. We also don't recommend specific contractors by name in our Quote Review service — our job is to evaluate the one you've already chosen, not to steer you somewhere we'd quietly profit from.

Based in Waterloo Region, Ontario. Core service area is Kitchener, Waterloo, Cambridge, and Guelph, plus surrounding small towns — Elmira, St. Jacobs, New Hamburg, Ayr, Breslau, Fergus, Elora, and Puslinch. Every review is delivered remotely, so geography inside Ontario doesn't change turnaround. Homeowners elsewhere in Ontario can reach out and we'll let them know honestly whether their project is a fit.

Contract Link launched as a formal service company recently, but it's built on years of real construction and project-management experience across Southern Ontario. The advisor practice that became Contract Link started informally — friends, family, and neighbours asking for help on quotes — and grew into a structured service when the same kind of help kept being asked for.

Quote Review (the three tiers — $49, $197, $397) is a one-time analysis of an existing contractor quote. Full Project Brokerage is end-to-end management of an entire renovation, from contractor sourcing through to completion. Quote Review is the fit for homeowners who already have a contractor and want a second opinion. Brokerage is the fit for larger or multi-trade jobs where you want an independent project manager running the whole build. More on Brokerage →

Yes. If a Quote Review deliverable doesn't surface at least one actionable finding — a clarification, a missing scope item, a flagged risk, or a pricing concern worth raising — we refund the order. In practice we've never had to issue that refund, because every contractor quote we've read has had at least one. That's what makes the service useful.

Quote Review tiers are refundable in full if you request a refund before we've started the review. Once the review is delivered, refunds are issued only if our quality guarantee triggers (see above). Project Brokerage engagements have their own terms set at engagement start, since they involve ongoing work over weeks or months — those terms are spelled out clearly in the Brokerage engagement agreement.

For an owner-occupied home, no — homeowner advisory fees aren't generally deductible in Canada. For a rental property or investment property, our fees may be deductible as a property-management or professional-fee expense. We're not accountants — confirm with your tax advisor before claiming any expense.

Yes. Lots of our reviews are bought by adult children for aging parents who are about to sign a contractor quote, or by friends helping a less-construction-confident homeowner through a renovation. Buy the tier that fits, and just let us know in the order notes who the actual homeowner is so we can address the deliverable to them.

We use AI as a research and quality-control tool — the way any modern professional service does — but every Quote Review is anchored in human construction experience and reviewed line-by-line before it leaves. We don't sell scraped-template reports. Every deliverable is custom to the quote you sent and the project you described.

Yes. If your project is sensitive — a high-profile address, a commercial property, a complex legal situation — mention it in your contact message and we'll sign a mutual NDA before any documents change hands. Default-on confidentiality applies to every homeowner review even without a signed NDA.

Your contact details, project details, and any contractor documents stay between you and Contract Link. We never share them with the contractor whose quote we're reviewing. We never sell or pass homeowner information to third parties. The full data-handling specifics are in our privacy policy.

Only if you decide to tell them. Tiers 1 and 2 (Quick Quote Check and Risk & Scope Review) are entirely behind the scenes — we send the deliverable to you, and what you do with it is up to you. Tier 3 (Broker-Assisted Review) is the only service where we engage directly with your contractor on your behalf, and only with your explicit go-ahead.

If you're a residential or commercial contractor serving the Kitchener-Waterloo-Cambridge-Guelph region and you meet the Network Standards (insurance, WSIB, written scopes, clean homeowner conduct), yes. There's no membership fee, no per-lead charge, and no exclusivity. The Network is a vetted curation layer for our Project Brokerage clients — not a paid-referral marketplace.

Because the moment we charge contractors, the analysis stops serving homeowners and starts serving whoever pays the bill. Our entire business model is built on staying independent of the trades. Contractors get vetted onto a list we draw from for brokered projects; homeowners pay us for the brokerage service. Contractors never pay us anything.

No, because the two streams are deliberately walled off. We never review a Network contractor's quote when a homeowner has paid us for an independent review, and we never recommend specific Network contractors by name to Quote Review clients. The Quote Reviews are vendor-neutral by structural design. The Network only enters the picture on full Project Brokerage engagements, where the homeowner has hired us to manage the build.

If you have a contractor quote ready to review, buy the tier that fits and send us the document. If you're earlier in the process — still planning, not sure which tier — use the contact form to tell us what you're working on. We'll reply within one business day with a tier recommendation and an honest read on whether Contract Link is a fit.

The contractor's quote document (PDF, photo, or screenshot — whatever format you have), and a few project details: scope, your timeline, and any context you'd like flagged. After you place an order, we send a short follow-up email asking for these — reply with the documents attached and the 48-hour clock starts.

Yes. Send a short message through the contact form with your project details and we'll reply within one business day. No sales call, no pressure — just an honest read on whether Contract Link is the right fit for what you're working on.