It’s all about your perspective. If we assume that we would class ourselves as the benchmark for quality and pretty much every job you see is worse quality than you could do yourself then 95% is an accurate description. Purely speaking about the trades in my industry.
In fact, it was only last week that I completed a Bathroom for a designer that I hadn’t worked with before. He came on site and we had a chat with the customer. I had mitred and resin filled/polished the external tile corners instead of using tile trim. The designer noticed this and said to the customer that he could get 200 Tilers in to do the job and he might see 1 out of the 200 who could do this. So, perhaps 95% is an under estimate.
I think what
@27neth was originally getting at is that a lot of the tradesman he has worked with, he wouldn’t get to work in his house because in all likelihood he could do a better job himself. It’s a fair point and I agree with him.
Nobody has mentioned that they are cowboys, purely said that they wouldn’t have them work in their own house.
Regarding people who participate in internet trades forums, these people are a different breed. Generally they are far better tradesman than most. They are usually on these forums as they want to better themselves/share information with other like minded trades. Obviously a generalisation. I am somewhat informed as I’ve been a member of these forums since the early noughties.
It’s all personal experience though. The company I used to work for spent five years looking for good Tilers. We’re talking 50 people who didn’t make the grade. My example above, it took me ten years to find a really good electrician. It’s basic stuff, on the job sheet it says to double up on dust sheets with the bottom layer being poly backed dust sheets. Turn up on site and the guy has an old curtain underneath a pair of steps and that’s it. Customers carpet is worth tens of thousands of pounds.
It’s not all about the quality of work, it’s the whole package. A lot is about respect towards the customers property.