A Real Grownup
Jaimie on Apr 29th 2008
This will sound odd, but I had three companies come to do estimates for a new furnace for our house yesterday, and now I feel like a real grownup. I don’t know why, but something about actually trying to make an informed decision about a big purchase for our house has made me feel like an adult in a way nothing else really has before, even buying the house itself.
It is odd. And I am so not looking forward to telling the two we don’t choose that we didn’t choose them. (We haven’t decided yet, but we’re not getting three furnaces, so we’ll have to turn down two of them eventually.) But still, for now, I feel like a grownup. 
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Let me ease your mind. I am a furnace salesman and I perfer to hear back from my opportunities that didn’t sell rather than be left in the dark. It doesn’t hurt my feelings, in fact it is often helpful. Maybe I was too expensive, maybe I didn’t offer a product/ service you really wanted. A tip: if you don’t want to speak to them you could call on an evening or weekend and leave a voice mail; that is better than nothing at all.
You know what makes it easy to turn people down? Be specific, and treat it as part of the negotiation process. Say, I’m sorry, company X quoted us $Y. If you can’t beat that, we’ll have to go with them. Then, it’s their choice, not yours.