I don't have any positive things to say about angieslist. I think it was a good idea at one time but has run its course. In my neck of the woods we now much prefer Nextdoor, much more local and user friendly.

I just joined it for free and found it totally useless!

These a little bit of bickering on Nextdoor in my area, so I have not joined for that reason

Ditto Arkansas Girl.

Many don't understand that Angie's List is a pay to play site. Service providers pay to be listed. It's advertising. There's no advance screening.

The Better Business Bureau is similar, companies who pay are featured more prominently and may receive a better rating.

Elmer not sure if that is accurate. I, a client, had to call customer Svc to add my new hair stylist as she was not in their current hair stylist list. She doesn't have to pay anything. Maybe she would have to pay if she advertises or if she's listed first but I know she will not pay them a cent for just being listed. Did I misunderstand something

bossyvossy is right. Our handyman-carpenter extraordinaire is on the list gratis, but has been hounded afterward to pay to advertise, etc.

I rely on Yelp reviews for businesses.

@wantoretire_did. Uh oh, I'll have to warn her. But doesn't YELP hound businesses also?

You have to be careful with Yelp because it has a pimping approach that many users don't realize.

If you do a search for your area's Best Restaurant, or Best Plumber, or whatever, the order of appearance is based on pay to play, not ratings. Yelp calls that Best Match. And yes, I've heard Yelp does hound businesses for "sponsorship".

What you need to do is go to Filters and change the sort order from Best Match to Highest Rated. In anything other than a small town, you'll see that list order will change considerably.

Then, keep in mind that many businesses will stuff the ballot box, and in other cases, only people with extreme views (good or bad) will bother to post a rating. Take it as an indication, not an ironclad assessment. I find that the ratings with a large number of individual votes tend to be the most credible. Anything under 20, I view with skepticism.

I've heard once you join Angie's list you can't delete it off your computer. I don't know if that has changed or not.. When we needed a contractor to do some work for us we relied on friends input. We've had no problems.

I have had very good luck with the local nextdoor forum for my neighborhood. We had a thief blatantly stealing from the neighborhood and we could not get response from the law. We as a group effort took pictures him in the subdivision with stolen property in hand, we had video of him stealing from several homes. Some neighbors confronted him face to face and told him this was going to get deadly soon. He continued but we all stood our ground and finally got a response from the law. Turns out he is part of a large theft ring they have been trying to bust. We provided everything they needed to get the creep, he confessed and spilled his guts on the others. They found a warehouse full of stolen property! We were told to go there and identify our property. I was very hesitant about joining nextdoor, I don't like the fine print at all. But during the time of the flood it was so helpful for many of us. They put the squash down on bickering and misbehaving. It's a very good resource for local and recommended services. And for selling things too. Plus it's your neighbors. Through this ordeal with the thief I have made a few new friends I didn't know in my subdivision.

Love NextDoor! It's helpful in so many ways.

I think Nextdoor may be useful for many neighborhoods but it isn't for mine. There's a rather low volume of posts and few are of much interest.

It may be because my neighborhood has a homeowners association and all matters concerning roads, burglaries, security, and other general news, etc., is handled by the manager (and communicated via email).

I have used (and recommended) homeadvisor.com. It's free and got almost immediate contact from contractors, tradesmen, etc. associated with them. I read that Angie's List was in trouble for only posting positive reviews, or something like that.

I have used HA also and it has been a good experience. Very fast contact w/prospective Svc providers

I joined Angie's List about seven or eight years ago. They were a real pain. They were tracking my searches and then calling me on my phone several times to try to get a review. I ended up going with someone else's recommendation. I don't like to be hounded. I did not get a comfortable feeling from them.

I like Nextdoor, too!. Overall, it is helpful and interesting.

There is occasional "drama" but I don't have to get involved if I'm not interested.

After reading this I had to go to Angie's List and see what this was all about. A few years ago, I was a paying member of Angie's List and quite liked it. Well, Wow! What a change. This is nothing like Angie's List used to be. I am underwhelmed.

Had not heard of Nextdoor until reading this thread. Will see if we have one in this area.

What has changed about AL? I haven't noticed anything.

In my personal experience, some of their business practices have been questionable, imo, unrelated to reviews.

As far as reviews disappearing, there is an option to look further back than 3 years to see old reviews.

I joined NextDoor and was surprised at the amount of wheelin'dealin' posts. Like others, I have found some folks get heated very quickly and a seemingly benign post morphs into a Hot Topic discussion.

What I recall about the previous Angie's List was that when one launched the particular company, to the far right was a graph indicating how many As, Bs, Cs, etc., had been earned. I also seem to recall that you could pull up all like reviews together. It has been a few years, so I can't articulate anything more specific at the moment. All I can say is that I thought "Wow," when I opened up the first company of the new AL. Also, I just pulled up my landscaper and all of his reviews have been removed. That is just wrong, IMO. He must not be paying the new owners.

I have had a great experience on Nextdoor. Because of it residents of my small town (the entire population is about the same as the number of students who attended my high school) were able to finally organize and get rid of our corrupt mayor. Now we have a mayor and aldermen who are straightening things out.

I think it works better when you actually KNOW your neighbors. All the other posters on mine are just names to me:(

Hi folks - popping in with a reminder that for home remodeling and service folks, Houzz actually has a pretty robust directory that includes reviews. (As you know, houzz is 100% free for you) The more reviews that are in the system, the better, so if you are so inclined, I'd encourage you to review any home design, build, or service pro you've used, so others can benefit from your experience. Btw, houzz is also not a pay for play lead generation site, like many others. Pros can pay for enhanced directory placement, but it has absolutely no impact on the reviews that are posted for them.

http://houzz.com/writeReview

Sorry to interrupt!!