Three quotes arrive for the same garage. They are all described as an epoxy floor. One is a page and a half with a scope of work, a product schedule and a moisture test line item. One is four lines on a phone. One arrived from a crew who knocked on the door and said they had material left over from a job down the street.
Those are not three prices for the same thing. They are three completely different pieces of work that happen to share a word, and the only way to tell them apart is to ask questions the fast quote cannot survive. Here are the ones that matter.
Surface preparation is the whole job
Almost every coating failure traces back to preparation. Not product. Not weather. Preparation.
Ask how the slab will be prepared. The answer you want is mechanical: diamond grinding or shot blasting. The answer that should end the conversation is acid etching alone. Etching does not remove adhesives, curing compounds or oil, it leaves residue that has to be neutralized and rinsed, and it does not produce a consistent profile. It exists because it is quick.
Then ask what profile they are targeting. The concrete repair industry uses a numbered concrete surface profile scale, and coating manufacturers state which profile their system requires for the film thickness being applied. A contractor who can tell you which profile the manufacturer specifies, and how they will achieve it, is a contractor who has read the data sheet. That answer alone separates most of the field.
Ask what happens to existing coatings, sealers, adhesive and oil contamination. Ask what happens to cracks and to control joints, specifically, because covering a moving joint with a coating is a guaranteed crack line and it is one of the most common shortcuts taken.
Ask about slab moisture, and watch the reaction
This is the single most useful question on the Gulf Coast, because the honest answer is technical and the dishonest answer is dismissive.
Ask whether the slab will be tested for moisture, which method, and who pays for it. Ask what the manufacturer’s stated limit is for the exact system being quoted, and what happens if the reading comes back over that limit. Ask whether the result will be given to you in writing.
A contractor who says moisture is not an issue in Houston is either inexperienced or hoping. Expansive clay soils hold water for weeks, many older slabs here were poured without a vapor retarder, and the humidity never gives concrete a long dry season. Our guide to moisture testing before installation covers what the methods are and what the numbers mean, and it is worth reading before you take the quotes.
Get the products named
Ask for the manufacturer and product name for every layer: primer, body coat and topcoat. Then ask for the technical data sheets.
Two things to look for. First, the number of coats and the film build per coat, because a floor described as three coats can be anything at all until you know the thickness. Second, what the topcoat actually is. If the space has significant glass or the floor is exposed to sun, the topcoat needs to be a UV stable aliphatic urethane rather than a clear epoxy, because standard epoxy ambers under ultraviolet light and shifts the color you chose.
A contractor who will not name products is protecting the ability to substitute them. That is the only reason to withhold the information.
Insurance, workers and who is actually on your slab
Ask for a certificate of general liability insurance, issued directly by the insurer or the broker rather than forwarded as an image. Ask whether the crew is covered by workers compensation, because Texas does not require most private employers to carry it and an uninsured injury on your property is your problem to discover afterwards.
Ask whether the crew doing the work is employed or subcontracted, and who supervises. There is nothing wrong with subcontracted labor, and there is a great deal wrong with nobody being able to tell you who will be in your building.
Check that the business has a real address you can find, and that the address matches what is on the paperwork. Look at the volume and the recency of reviews rather than the star rating alone, because a rating from a handful of reviews says much less than a rating built over years. For reference, our own profile carries sixty six reviews at a four point eight average, and our address is 9421 FM 2920 BLDG 4, Tomball TX 77375.
Read the warranty properly
Warranties in this trade range from genuinely meaningful to decorative, and the length is the least informative part of them.
Ask what is actually covered. Material only, or material and labor? A material warranty from a manufacturer covers a defective product, which is rarely what fails. Labor coverage is what pays for a floor to be ground off and redone.
Ask what voids it. Moisture related failure is very commonly excluded, which is precisely why the moisture test question matters so much: an excluded failure mode plus no test means the risk sits entirely with you. Hot tire pickup, chemical damage and impact damage are other common exclusions.
Ask how long the company has been trading. A ten year warranty is only worth as much as the probability that the company exists in ten years, and a business with a short history offering a long warranty is offering an opinion rather than a guarantee.
Ask whether it transfers on sale of the property, which matters more than people expect on a residential floor.
Compare scopes, not totals
The most common mistake buyers make is placing three numbers side by side and treating the difference as a discount.
Put the scopes side by side instead. Preparation method. Crack repair. Joint treatment. Number of coats and film build. Topcoat type. Moisture testing. Edge and threshold termination. Cleanup and disposal. Warranty terms. Once those columns are filled in, the differences between the quotes usually explain themselves, and the outlier is normally missing several rows rather than being better value.
If a quote does not contain enough detail to fill in those columns, that is itself the finding.
Red flags worth walking away from
Leftover material from another job. That is not how coatings are ordered and it is not how they are stored.
Pressure to decide today, and large cash deposits. A deposit is normal. A large cash deposit to an unfamiliar company with no fixed address is not.
A refusal to discuss scheduling around weather. Heat shortens working time, humidity causes surface defects, and dew point governs whether a coating can go down at all. A contractor who says conditions make no difference in Houston has not been paying attention.
No sample, no test patch and no willingness to show completed work of the same type. On decorative finishes especially, a sample made by the crew who will do your floor is the only reliable preview.
Reasonable expectations on the other side
Vetting works both ways. A good contractor will want access to the slab, realistic scheduling, decisions made before mobilization rather than during, and payment terms honored. They will also tell you when the answer is no: when the slab needs drying, when the drainage needs fixing first, or when the finish you want is not right for the room.
That last one is the strongest signal there is. Ask any contractor to describe a job they turned down and why. The answer tells you more than any brochure.
You can read more about how we work on our about page, see the range on our services overview, and check the questions we get asked most on our FAQ page. For the homeowner view of a garage project, see our garage floor coating guide, and for realistic service life see how long epoxy flooring lasts in Houston. We cover the metro from Tomball, with details on the service areas page. Call (832) 521-4347 or start with the instant quote form.
Frequently asked questions
Does an epoxy flooring contractor in Texas need a state license?
Texas does not issue a state license for flooring or general contracting work of this type, so a claim of being licensed should be checked rather than assumed. What you can verify is insurance, a real business address, trading history and completed work. Ask for a certificate of insurance issued directly by the insurer or broker.
Is acid etching acceptable preparation for an epoxy floor?
Not on its own. Etching does not remove adhesives, curing compounds or oil contamination, it leaves residue that has to be neutralized and rinsed, and it does not produce a consistent surface profile. Mechanical preparation by diamond grinding or shot blasting is the standard, and a contractor proposing etching alone is choosing speed over adhesion.
What should a written epoxy flooring quote include?
Preparation method, treatment of cracks and control joints, the manufacturer and product name for every layer, the number of coats and the film build, topcoat type, whether slab moisture will be tested and by which method, how edges and thresholds terminate, cleanup and disposal, and the warranty terms with exclusions stated. If a quote does not let you fill in those items, it cannot be compared to another quote.
What does an epoxy floor warranty usually exclude?
Moisture related failure is very commonly excluded, along with hot tire pickup, chemical damage and impact damage. That is why the moisture testing question matters: if the failure mode is excluded and nobody tested the slab, the risk sits with the customer. Also check whether the cover is material only or material and labor, and whether it transfers when the property is sold.
How do I compare epoxy flooring quotes that look very different?
Compare scopes rather than totals. Build a table with preparation method, crack and joint treatment, number of coats and film build, topcoat type, moisture testing, terminations, cleanup and warranty as the rows, and one column per quote. The differences usually explain themselves, and the outlier is normally missing rows rather than offering better value.