Darius Kraus Electric

We recently purchased a home in Oakland and immediately realized we needed to have our main service upgraded due to its limitations and possible fire hazard as the old panel had some known faults we read about during our research.  

I spoke to about 6-8 different companies and Darius was the only one who I felt confident could get our upgrade done correctly and in a manner that wouldn't be a huge eye sore on the outside of our house.  Additionally, while not the cheapest bid, I felt Darius' bid was much more thorough and to top it off it was very reasonable and not anywhere near the most expensive one we received

Despite being in demand and extremely busy he worked us into his schedule to drop by and give us a  quote soon after I reached out.  During his visit, he was very up front about his timeline and schedule due to shortage of boxes and materials along with the PG&E approval and scheduling.  We weren't in a rush so I was more than willing to wait until everything was ready

Once the job started, it only took them two days.  We were down for a very brief time while they cut over to the new panel and connected all our existing circuitry.  Had it not been for them waiting around for the city and PG&E they probably could have been done even faster!  

In the end, we were ecstatic with the work he and his team performed and have had zero issues since!  If you're in the market for a panel upgrade or any major electrical work, there is no one else I would call besides Darius! Thanks again!

We've reached out to Darius a couple times--he replaced a couple of broken breakers in our electrical box and rewired some lights that got disconnected in our basement (the previous owners of our home were amateur electricians ).  Five stars both times--he solved the problem, was timely and communicative and the price seemed reasonable to me.  Would definitely work with Darius again and recommend to others.

Darius is our go-to electrical contractor & we highly recommend his professionalism, expertise and his team's focus when on the job. We reached out on a recommendation after buying our house. Despite being in demand, he was responsive and worked well with us and around our other contractors.  He detailed the estimate to upgrade our electrical service & panel with the materials he would use, and the cost was representative of the final amount. He also helped us install the new kitchen vent, separate our first floor wiring from the second, prepare for installation of a second meter, and navigate the Oakland permit & inspection process. No surprises, twists, turns or over promising. Darius said what he would do & did what he said. We trust him and will work with him again!

We hired Darius to rewire our 1920s house off knob and tube as well as upgrade our service panel. Also, we bought the house a little over a year ago and needed to change out some terrible lighting in the kitchen, etc. Darius and his crew did a fantastic job installing recessed lighting, changing out several light fixtures, and dealing with our persnickety-ness (haha). The rewiring and panel upgrade also went very smoothly. Darius detailed the costs in his estimate and final invoice and explained the process well from start to finish. We would highly recommend him and will hire him again for any future electrical work!

Very responsive and excellent customer service. So easy to work with a lot of patience! Thank you Darius!

This review is long overdue for such a wonderful company.  Last year I contacted Darius to replace knob and tube wiring in our 1920's house.  Based on the reviews here it sounded like he had a lot of experience doing that.  I had Darius and a few other companies come out to give bids.  Darius bid was well thought out and timely.  Darius left us with a sense of confidence that his team could do the job well.  After accepting Darius bid for the electrical work I asked if he could run some conduit and ethernet cables for my home network.  We talked what I wanted and we added that onto the job.

I was shocked as how few holes Darius needed to cut in the walls.  Other electricians  wanted to much more holes in the walls to minimize the amount of fished they had to do.  This work was prompted by our design to put insulation in the attic and his responsiveness made corridantating between companies seamless.

To borrow a line for another review, if we had another electrical project, I would call Darius and skip other estimates.

I am impressed with Darius' work and process from start to finish. Our first telephone conversation gave me confidence as Darius provided concise and detailed information regarding costs, technical details and administrative processes.

The scope of work involved upgrading the main electrical panel to 200 amps, update and add receptacles to code and make the panel solar ready.

In spite of the spike in construction due to low interest rates/refinancing Darius showed up as scheduled and completed the work quickly and efficiently. He worked well with PG and E and even obtained a needed variance. Inspections and permis were all handled by Darius and the inspections passed without delays. He also worked well with our solar installers.

Darius' team, Christian and Jason are very competent technicians and craftsmen as well. Receptacles and switches were precisely installed this was particularly appreciated in the kitchen. The placement of the electrical trim was precise and maintained a clean and balanced look as relates to counter tops and cabinets as well as existing electrical.

The entire team had excellent suggestions on how to place receptacles as regards aesthetics and functionality. Darius and team explained technical issues in clear layman's terms.

It is clear that Darius knows his business. This is underscored by his calm, friendly and professional demeanor. His first visit to estimate costs was more thorough than the other contractors. He was the only contractor to bring in a ladder and check the attic crawl space. Darius also saved me from paying for unnecessary work due to his detailed knowledge of local city codes.

All work was clean, precise and the finish work non invasive and performed with skilled craftsmanship. Seemingly difficult portions of the project were completed much more smoothly than I expected.

Darius' costs are transparent,  fair and very reasonable. Costs came in as estimated with no surprises.  The end result is the replacement of the hazardous Federal pacific panel , safer circuits and receptacle locations that make life in this 1920s home much safer and more functional.

Darius is my go to guy for any future electrical work. The entire process was Smooth, trouble free and without delays.

Darius is great! He did a fantastic job, and at a lower price than any other bid. My favorite part about working with him is that he doesn't condescend or talk circles around you like so many other contractors. Most of the electricians I spoke to just rattled off elaborate technical terms until I stopped asking questions. Darius explains patiently in plain language and tries to make sure you understand.

Darius and his team are great!

If we had another electrical project, I would call Darius and skip other estimates.

After taking estimates from four electricians, we asked Darius to rewire a number of overloaded circuits, power our garage, and remove our old knob-and-tube. It ended up being an almost complete rewire job for a good deal less than some of the partial estimates.

Start to finish, the job was quick and took as long as Darius expected. The final price was surprisingly close to the initial estimate. There were a handful of small additions of ours as the work progressed and a few points where Darius suggested small changes. The changes were all for the better with minimal impact to the overall project timeline/budget.

I can't recommend Darius enough.

Had my 1920's house wiring replaced and Darius, Jason and crew were exceptional contractors and a pleasure to have around. Beautiful work, efficient, super competent. I couldn't be more pleased.

Darius and his helper installed a new main electrical panel and generator switch in our 78 year old Piedmont house. He was one of three people that bid on the job. His solution was elegant and maintained the classic look of our home. Other contractors bid higher and had somewhat half baked proposals. I'm an Electrical Engineer and rather picky when it comes to electrical work on my house.

Darius arrived promptly on the scheduled date at 8 AM and said the job would take four hours. I was skeptical that the job could be completed so quickly. He was in and out in slightly over four hours. The job site was totally cleaned up and the placement of the exterior electrical boxes was neat and clean. No more bids next time....I'm only calling Darius.

Side note: After researching our 1960's Federal Pacific main panel on the internet and talking to the Piedmont building department, I was convinced that the panel could be defective and cause a fire at any time. If your main panel is made by Federal-Pacific google search it and then call Darius.

Darius and his co-worker installed two fans and three ceiling lights at our home. He had previously installed garage sconce wall lights. His work is always efficient, clean and he does a superb job.
He is local, arrives on time, is focused and even cleans up the work area very well. He is usually booked several weeks out, but he is worth the wait. Highly recommend him, and will definitely use his services again for any electrical work in the future.

Don't bother with three bids, just hire Darius.  In 17 years of home ownership, he's the best contractor I've ever worked with.  Responsive, friendly, unbelievably punctual, fast, and above all an amazing electrician who does very clean work.  And the price was shockingly reasonable.  He did a full rewire on my 1906 house, which was more than I originally asked for.  I asked him to do the additional work, but the final price was basically the same as the estimate for the original scope of work.  I didn't know contractors like that still existed.  I'd hire him again tomorrow if he hadn't already replaced everything.

Can't recommend him highly enough.  If he's booked out a few months, wait for him.

TLDR:  You should hire Darius for your electrical work.  He's honest, flexible, patient, responsible, punctual, and does excellent work.  His quotes were more clear and reasonable than any we've seen.

We met with several electricians for some major work on our house.  Darius' quote was by far the most clearly laid out and reasonable.  He made it so we could pick and choose what we wanted to do and it was clear how the price would be affected.  Darius replaced all our knob and tube wiring, added many new outlets, a bathroom fan and ducting, removed sconces and patched holes, wired and installed new ceiling lights, rewired the breaker box, and installed a periscope to extend our service connection away from the house.  He pulled permits and coordinated the inspection with the permitting office and also handled dealing with PG&E for the periscope work we did.

We'd typically meet Darius in the morning before heading out to work to go over questions (we always had a ton of questions and Darius was always patient and willing to answer everything).  Throughout the job Darius always left everything in working order at the the end of the day and kept everything clean.  

Darius did an excellent job all around.  We're very happy with his work and will always call him first for electrical work.

Darius and his colleagues/employee Jason did an excellent job installing a bunch of smart led lights and 2 ceiling fans in my loft that has fairly tall concrete ceilings and also did a bunch of other electrical work as well including relocating and replacing switches.  A bunch of wiring in the bathroom in my loft didn't make that much sense and they were able to quickly fix it.  

They showed up on the day they said they would and at the time they said they would as well.     They also did a good job explaining the options I had in the future going forward if I wanted to replace a fairly noisy bathroom fan and explaining how a bunch of things work as well.   And they did a great job minimizing any dust from the work they did and cleaning up afterwords.  

I will certainly call Darius Kraus Electric first for any electrical work in the future.

Darius came to our rescue when we could not turn our furnace on during a cold spell.  He was able to come the same day I contacted him, he was on time, professional, polite and reasonable.

He checked the circuit breaker box, and then crawled under the house and found the problem in one of the junction boxes.  He corrected the problem, and now I am very happy writing this review in a nice warm home.  

He is definitely the one to call for electrical issues or problems.

I originally wanted to go with Darius after a recommendation from my Realtor and a good initial experience with the estimate.

However, I have now called and left messages twice along with several emails with no reply in over a month.

I understand that they may be busy, but I do expect more than just being ignored. I will be notifying my Realtor of my experience and taking my business elsewhere.

You know that phrase 'still waters run deep'?  That describes Darius.  He's not a big talker, he's not flashy, but he knows his stuff and is a delight to work with.  We have an old victorian in alameda, got told by insurance that we have to take out all the knob & tube.  I got quotes from 5 different companies, I got told everything from we have to bring the whole house up to code to you can just write a fake letter and not upgrade.  Darius was not the cheapest (middle), but we went with him because we felt we could trust him.  We ended up being super happy with our decision.   They showed up everyday on the dot, left things very clean, actually listened to and executed what we wanted.  It felt really good to be able to hand off something to them and know they will do it right.  And now we have insurance, upgraded electrical and even a permit.  Living large...

I agree with Paul F.  Darius is the guy you want.  Him and his guys were fast, clean and efficient.  We had the old knob and tube removed and replaced, many new outlets and fixtures and a new panel with a proper ground rod.  They did this all in about a week and a half with little disruption to our daily life.  
The peace of mind having new and proper wiring is invaluable.  His patience with all my questions was really great.  
You guys are awesome.  Thank you.

Darius was brought in by my General Contractor to do the electrical for a remodel, which meant rewiring and bringing my 1949 kitchen into the 21st Century. He's fast and efficient and did a great job helping me figure out what kind of lighting would work for the space. Team Darius is a pleasure to work with and will be my go to guy for any future electrical work.

Darius installed my grandmother's chandelier in no time.  Did an excellent job and very reasonably priced.  Thank you Darius.  Highly recommended.

I had a serious problem with short power outages at my house and Darius came to the rescue!

Not only is he professional, but he's also prompt, honest and very reasonably priced.

He fixed the problem within an hour and I am so grateful for his services.

This review is long overdue. Had the pleasure of working with Darius to fix my electrical wiring in my bathroom last year. Before Darius came by, I had two other electricians come and look at my faulty bathroom lighting to give me quotes. They were both slightly higher than Darius'.....however, the real problem was that neither of the other electricians can give me a confident solution to fix the faulty wiring AND both said that the quote may cost more depending on what was behind the wall as they just weren't sure what the true solution to the problem was. One of them was gonna take down the mirror-cabinet and tear down a big portion of the drywall just to be sure what he was working with (which was to me, absurd).

Darius came on time and fixed my wiring in less than 2-3 hours and cleaned up after himself (without having to tear down anything). Thank god the bathroom light still works because I did not like peeing in the dark. One of the things that really stood out was that he seemed like a really honest business person. He clearly communicated what the project was and what to expect.  Darius even dropped by and gave me a free quote! The other guys  charged me $70 just to come by to do an inspection!

I highly recommend this dude! He really knows his trade!

Darius was referred to us by another electrician whom we had contacted because he was one of the first to show up on yelp since he had more reviews.  That guy was too busy for our job and the dozens of other electricians we contacted were too expensive, unresponsive, not available when i needed them, or just plain rude.  I am glad that nobody else worked out though because Darius has been great.  

From the beginning, his demeanor was nice and I could tell he wasn't some slimey contractor who was trying to get over on me.  He gave us a very reasonable quote, was responsive, showed up on time, did a great job, AND even took $300 off the price we were originally quoted since they ended up finishing the work in 6 hours instead of 8!!!! Someone that honest is just unheard of nowadays.  I would highly recommend hiring Darius and we will definitely be using him for any electric work in the future.

We hired Darius for a small job. As others have written, he's very responsive, affordable, completes the job quickly and very well. We'd definitely hire him again!

We used Darius Kraus Electric for three different jobs: to redo our knob & tube wiring in our 100+ year-old house; to investigate a shorted out light and to replace said shorted-out light (as well as our dining room light). All three jobs were done thoroughly and professionally with great attention to detail. I highly recommend Darius for jobs big and small. We'll be sure to use him again in the future.

I needed a small job taken care of. Darius Kraus was responsive, came on time, and made quick work of the minor repair. I would definitely call him again. He outshone other non-responsive electricians. One I called insisted that I needed to replace my light fixture without even taking a look. Darius Kraus provided excellent service.

We hired Darius to install a new chandelier over our dining room table.  He came on time to the minute, got the work done in a timely and efficient manner, and charged us an absolutely reasonable fee.  We would hire him again in a minute.  A competent, no nonsense, honest guy.

Can't say enough about my experience with Darius Kraus. I recently bought a new home and had a terrible experience with a bid from another electrician (also highly rated on yelp). I ended up reaching out to Darius via Yelp for a second bid.

He was a lot easier to work with, prioritizing the safety and cosmetic needs that I had and he was priced way better. From an execution standpoint, he did a fantastic job. He was reliable, friendly, thorough and honest (as in, calling out when a request had a free solution vs. paying him to fix it). I hired him again for exterior electrical work and I would hire him again in the future.

Great communication - I called and he contacted me back right away.  We communicated via text mostly - which is more convenient for me.  We went back and forth on whether we needed an electrician, as our issue seemed to be the dryer (we also had the dryer technician come out but the HOA wasn't happy with their assessment so they asked us to hire an electrician), but when he came out, he assessed what was going on in our unit - found that everything worked properly - went to take a look at the main breaker and saw that the wiring were really loose.  he tightened them, didn't overcharge us.  he was honest, prompt, and trustworthy.
he went the extra mile by showing us how everything worked - Little things to watch out for etc.  he took his time explaining.  He also had to deal with our nightmare of a property management because we live in a condo - he handled everything with ease.  It's been stressful lately due to all the electrical shortage, power outages here and there and the property management adding much more to that grief, and he worked his magic and we were with light again.  I talked to and got a quote from a lot of the electricians out there that I found on yelp and I found him to be the most knowledgeable and competitive with his pricing.   If you need an electrician, hire Darius.

Very helpful and prompt service! Will call Darius with any new electrical jobs.

I was reffered to this electrician through a friend who raved about him,  so the bar was set pretty high from the beginning.  

Well,  all the bars were met.  On time,  did the work exactly how I wanted it,  cleaned up after himself,  and charged me the price that was quoted.

These guys are awesome, there's no other way to say it. They know their stuff, work quickly and effectively and his prices are fair. Happy to have found such a great electrician. Thanks!

I would recommend Darius' work to anyone needing a reliable, reasonably priced electrician.

He recently added a number of new outlets to our house, fixed some existing problems, and added new lighting in our garage. I found him very easy to work with - he was prompt in returning my original call, provided a detailed easy to understand estimate, and completed the work as scheduled. His work is very high quality.

I would hire him again for any electrical work needed at my house, and would recommend him to friends and neighbors.

First of all, I immediately give props to people who show up on time!! Darius was also very professional and gave me an estimate well below a competing bid. During the wiring job, he found that he didn't need to do much crawling around under the house and knocked some more $ of the job. Not all people are so honest!
Thanks so much, Darius!!

Solid electrician.  One of a few competent trades people I've met in the Bay Area.  Would have him continue to do work in the future.

Darius installed flat screen tv's, overhead lighting, wall sconces, and light switches for me. He did an amazing job. I would recommend him to anyone needing an electrician.

Darius came to our place on time and gave us an estimate on the spot, followed up by a detailed estimate in writing within 24 hrs.  He couldn't come to do the job, but he sent one of his colleagues/employee, Jason, who did an outstanding job.

Not only was the job done very well (no mess left behind either), they did it in less the time that was expected and their prices were unbeatable.

Thank you Darius Electric!

I needed an electrical service upgrade for my father's old home in Albany and contracted Darius to perform the work on the house.   PG&E informed us that they could charge a couple thousand dollars to extend a new power line and asked for a $1000.00 deposit to start the work.  PG&E would not provide a firm estimate up front.

Darius went the extra mile to contact PG&E for us to discuss the work that PG&E needed to perform.  Darius performed the electrical upgrade on the house in a manner that would minimize the work required by PG&E.  As a result, PG&E informed us that they would only be charging $250.00 for their work and refunding $750.00 of the deposit!

As the other reviewers have noted, I have found him to be professional, honest and reasonably priced.

Darius is the best.  I've had him do two jobs for our house, the second one being fairly large with replacing our old fuse panel and service with a new panel.  Great communicator - prompt responses to emails, arrived on time, and did the work as anticipated, and coordinated the work with the city.

Darius is the best!  My removed and then re-installed 3 sets of lighted dimmer switches, leaving the wires ultimately too short for repair by an amateur such as myself (or even my handyman, who decided not to risk it).  Darius came to the rescue.  He was prompt, amazingly speedy, and very pleasant.  He also checked out my other wiring issues, and fixed everyting for a VERY reasonable price.  I am going to have him do all of my electric work in the future (yes, folks, there are still some gnarly wiring issues to be addressed in my old house).  I highly recommend him.  Don't call anyone else:)  PS he doesn't come to NY- it was for my house in Oakland, CA.

We had to replace our circuit breakers and electrical panel, which involved extensive rewiring and relocating fuses in the house.  From start to finish, Darius was an exemplary professional.  We got several estimates, but Darius's was the clearest and  gave us the best value for our money.  He estimated it to be a two-day job.  He was on time and kept to his schedule, running wire through the attic and in the crawl space of the house.  He smoothly handled all the city permits and inspections.  He even managed to handle our two rambunctious boxers that followed him throughout the house.  He did an outstanding job and we highly recommend him.

We had an electrical problem, and within 2 hours of calling Darius, he's been out to the house, diagnosed the issue, and completely taken care of it -- all at a very reasonable rate. Now I know who to call if we ever have an electrical problem again!

Darius is capable, competent, and customer service oriented.