Hiring a general contractor is less a purchase than a transfer of risk. On any project that touches more than two trades, someone has to own the sequence of work, the permits, the inspections, the material orders, and the schedule that ties them all together. If there is no general contractor, that someone is you — and every late delivery, every failed inspection, and every gap between one trade finishing and the next one showing up becomes yours to manage from work, between meetings.
That is what IAS Remodeling of Katy actually offers homeowners across Katy and the surrounding area: the absorption of that coordination risk, on residential projects from a single bathroom to a whole-home renovation or a room addition. The rest of this page explains how we do it — and, because most people hire a general contractor once or twice in a lifetime, how to evaluate anyone you are considering, including us.
Sequencing a multi-trade project
Trade order is not a preference; it is physics and code. Plumbing and electrical rough-ins have to be complete — and inspected — before insulation and drywall close the walls. Tile has to be finished before a shower enclosure can even be measured, because glass is cut to the installed opening, not to the drawing. Countertops are templated only after the cabinets are set, which puts fabrication time squarely on the critical path of every kitchen.
Then there are lead times. Cabinetry, windows, specialty tile, and shower glass arrive on their own calendars, some of them measured in weeks. A project run well orders its long-lead materials before demolition begins, so the materials wait on the project instead of the project waiting on the materials. A project run poorly demolishes first, orders second, and leaves a family living around a stalled job site.
The third piece is what happens when something slips — because on real projects, something eventually does. Trades book their schedules in advance. When one finishes late, the next cannot simply arrive the following morning; they arrive when their calendar allows, and a small slip left unmanaged becomes a long one. The general contractor's job in that moment is to re-sequence: pull forward work that does not depend on the late item, keep the site productive, and keep you informed. This is the unglamorous substance of coordination, and it is most of what you are paying for.
Scope, change orders, and how the work gets priced
Every project starts with a written scope specific enough that another contractor could price it. Where a selection has not been made yet — you have not chosen the tile, say — the proposal carries a clearly labeled allowance, and you see exactly what number is assumed. Vague scopes are where remodeling disputes are born; specific ones are how they are prevented.
Scope changes mid-project come from two directions: decisions you make, and conditions nobody could see until the walls were open. Both are handled identically — described in writing, priced before the work happens, and signed before anyone acts. Nothing lands on an invoice by conversation. A priced change order is a decision point, not a bill: you can accept it, adjust it, or decline it with the full picture in front of you.
As for what general contractors charge, the honest market answer is that residential pricing models vary — fixed price, cost-plus, and hybrids all exist in this market, and none of them is inherently dishonest. What matters is that the model is stated plainly in your contract, and that any change to the number follows the written process above.
Permitting in the Katy area
"Katy" the mailing address is far larger than Katy the municipality. The incorporated City of Katy covers about fifteen square miles; the area people mean when they say they live in Katy is many times that size, and most of it is unincorporated. The practical consequence: which rulebook governs your project is a parcel-level question, and a contractor who assumes one answer for every Katy address is guessing.
Inside the city limits, the City of Katy permits residential work under the 2021 International Residential Code, adopted by ordinance in late 2023. Outside them, the path depends on the county the parcel sits in — and, a wrinkle few homeowners have reason to know, on whether a municipality has adopted a building code covering its extraterritorial jurisdiction, in which case the municipal code controls even outside city limits. On the Fort Bend County side, the county issues a Development Permit triggered by, among other things, any fully enclosed structure or new concrete slab of 400 square feet or more, and by any work within a mapped Special Flood Hazard Area. Those thresholds matter enormously for room additions, and we cover them in detail on that page.
One more threshold belongs in this conversation because it is set by scope rather than location: under the National Flood Insurance Program framework, a renovation of a home in a mapped flood zone whose cost reaches 50 percent of the structure's market value is treated as a substantial improvement, with significant consequences for what the whole structure must then comply with. If you are contemplating a large renovation, that threshold belongs in the design conversation from day one — we explain it on the whole-home page.
We confirm jurisdiction and permit requirements for your specific parcel before design is final. It is a small amount of homework that prevents the worst category of mid-project surprise.
How to vet a general contractor
This checklist is written to be useful even if you end up hiring someone else.
- A written scope another contractor could price. If the scope is a paragraph, the price is a guess and the disputes are prepaid.
- A current certificate of insurance, sent from the insurer. Not a photo of a card. IAS is fully insured, with insurance documentation available on request — anyone you consider should say the same and prove it as readily.
- Named, state-licensed trades for the work Texas licenses. Electrical, plumbing, and HVAC work must be performed by state-licensed professionals. Ask who will hold those licenses on your project, and check the numbers.
- A written change-order policy. The words you want to see: priced and signed before work proceeds.
- A payment schedule tied to milestones, with lien releases. Payments should follow completed work, never calendar dates, and each payment should come with a release.
- References from late in a project, or after it. Anyone can look organized in week one. Ask to speak with clients from a project's final month, when coordination is hardest.
A contractor who resents producing these is telling you something. One who produces them without being asked is telling you something too.
The work we take on
Most clients meet us through a kitchen or a bathroom — the rooms where remodeling returns the most daily life per dollar, and trade-dense enough that good coordination shows. The projects where a general contractor earns the title most visibly are the larger ones: whole-home renovations, where structure, systems, and finishes all move at once, and room additions, where the project has to clear permitting thresholds and HOA approval before the first shovel of dirt. And to be explicit about the other end of the range: there is no project too small to call about. The discipline that keeps a five-month renovation on schedule is the same discipline that makes a one-room remodel uneventful.
Who runs your project
IAS Remodeling of Katy is the Katy-focused practice of IAS Boutique Remodeling, the Houston residential remodeling company founded by Idan Shalom in 2019 — same owner, same trades, same standards, stated plainly because you should know exactly who you are hiring. Idan prices the work himself and stays personally accountable for it from the first site visit to the last item on the punch list; when you call with a question, the person who answers is the person with the authority to resolve it. You can read more about the company on the IAS Remodeling of Katy homepage — or skip the reading, tell us about the project, and judge us by how we handle the first conversation.