Best Businesses in Oakland, CA

I had a problem with my shower continuously running water and a leakage from the bathtub, the first two plumbers who came to check it overpriced me, and not only that, but was also paid for their estimates. The major reason i tried a third plumber was because my friend referred me to Plumbing For Less, and told me his estimates are free. He arrived on the day of the appointment, gave me the estimate and his price beat the other two guys. Off course i smiled and told him to begin the job.

Z and Z just replaced my sewer lateral and worked their a**es off to finish an unexpectedly hard job so we would have water that night. If I could give them 10 stars I would.  I'm still reeling from how fantastic this experience was....full story below.

I bought my house in Oakland last March and because we had so much other work to do, I neglected the sewer lateral until the very last minute.  I had been planning to have my regular plumber do it when he had a health problem and passed on the job.

I called Z and Z (among two others) for their stellar Yelp reviews (almost too many 5 star reviews, I was suspicious) and because they are a locally owned family business from Oakland/San Leandro area.  After Clayton gave me the bid, I got more skeptical because they were the lowest bid by a significant amount, and I was worried there might be some problem....but I decided to go forward after doing some research.

The day came and their crew showed up. Things were going great until the bullet they use to bore/break up the old lateral and drag the new pipe in hit an obstacle.  Turned out that at some point, solid concrete had been poured around the old lateral as footing for a retaining wall.  The bullet/bore could not expand due to the concrete.  It was stuck, and would have to be chipped out using a jackhammer.  Four hours of jackhammering later, they had only gotten down two feet into the concrete, but the footing was still far deeper than that.  When I got home from work at 5:45, they were still at it, but the going was slow -  it was looking like we would have to go to a hotel.  I had a houseguest, my roommate was going to a job interview the next day and needed the toilet/shower/washing mcahine...hotels cost hundreds of dollars... I was starting to regret my choice...UNTILLLLLLLLLLLL

This is when it got amazing.  Half an hour later, four family members of this family business showed up with a far heavier piece of equipment.  They relieved the day crew and within 45 minutes, they had gotten down to the bottom of the footings, broken through and cleared the path.  Then, one guy hand drove in the new lateral using a sledgehammer through several feet of the narrow earth and concrete path that had been cleared.  It was an incredible physical effort.  You rarely see that kind of intense sustained exertion in our era of sophisticated equipment.   It completely blew me away.

By 7:45, the new lateral was installed, plumbing was functional, and they had put up safety barricades and promised to be back the next day for inspection and to finish the job.  

When the EBMUD inspector showed the next day, he knew the crew and had nothing but good things to say.  The lateral passed, and Z and Z then did a phenomenal job restoring and finishing the sidewalk and patch where they installed the new cleanout in front of my house, including somehow matching decorative concrete from the 50's even though the needed stone was unavailable.  

These guys have a work ethic that you just don't run into that often...I am so impressed and grateful for the extra mile they went to save us from expensive consequences of the unexpected problem.  They are a wonderful business and I am truly grateful for their help.

We had a bit of an emergency situation when we noticed that sewer water was coming out of pipes in our backyard. Gross, I know. We were immediately in a state of panic thinking about what the problem could be and how much it would cost to fix. This was the first plumbing issue we have had to deal with as home owners, so it's not like we had a trusted plumber on speed dial.

We turned to Yelp and were contacted by a few different companies, one of which was Taz.  The first company that came out wanted to snake our line to find what the issue was. When Taz came out and saw what was happening, the guy said that snaking it wouldn't work and suggested doing some super power hydro cleaning thing. What he said made sense, so we had them do that the next day.

Keep in mind that the cleaning piece was really just so that they could then go in with a camera and identify the actual problem!  Needless to say, I was scared to answer the door after they identified the problem, for fear that I was going to be told it would take $20k to fix it.... NO! I was told that there were roots in the line and they cleaned those out and that with yearly cleaning, we will be good for quite a while!  They charged us for the cleaning and inspection and that was IT. Amazing.

Taz was professional, responsive, and ethical and we couldn't be happier with their service. We now have a trusted plumber on speed dial!

Bedr helped us out with a few projects at our place and did a great job on everything we asked for. He was quick to provide a quote and flexible enough to add a couple extra projects in as our needs grew. He was good about communication during the entire process and helped select a few pieces of hardware that we needed in order to complete the projects. I highly recommend Hassle-Free Handyman.

Been home during the lockdown with nothing to do. Decided to pick up a few projects to keep myself busy and they had everything I needed and they were open during the lockdown too which was a plus.

I found this plumber somewhat unconventionally. We had an issue with moisture getting into the exterior wall of our finished basement room, which is below grade. We do have a French drain, which was installed by the prior owners. But we knew nothing about it - where exactly it was, whether it was clean and functioning.

I had multiple contractors come take a look and most of them said we need to dig out all the concrete outside to locate the drain, and then waterproof - or even replace (!) our foundation etc. This is all because of a tiny bit of efflorescence on a wall.

Feeling stressed, I went for a walk. I turned the corner and saw the Gateway truck parked. I went up to the guy standing outside and asked if he could come take a look. To my surprise he said yes, he'd be there in a half hour.

The plumber, Daniel, showed up right on time. He took a look at everything, told us where the French drain was located based on the location of the catch basin, and said he could do a camera inspection for us. He came back a few days later and ran his cool camera thingy through all our pipes (I called it a house colonoscopy.). He climbed the fence and inspected the opening of the French drain, which is in our neighbor's yard. He gave us some ideas about how to mitigate the moisture issue without breaking the bank, and put my worries at ease.

Daniel was professional, on time, and extraordinarily reasonable for the amount of time he spent with us. I will be sure to call them to fix plumbing issues in the future.

Our shower valve was leaking bad. A quick search came up with Starboy. I requested a quote and they were in touch within minutes on a Sunday and even took our call to discuss a tankless water heater we wanted installed. Starboy sourced all the parts and water heater. They arrived a day after and delivered in half the time promised. Denver and his team are super professional and I feel great knowing that a knowledgeable team fixed my leak and installed my new water heater. I would definitely recommend Starboy Plumbing.

Attentive staff along with great customer service goes a long way in my book. They have fast availability as well as good prices. Having no hot water is such a pain but they made it simple by getting me in fast and not charging me an arm and a leg. When they came out the next day they were respectful and turned my hot water back on fast. I have no clue what exactly they did, all I know is that I have hot water again and I'm happy again! I liked the repair guy a lot so I even tipped him a small amount. What can I say? I'm super impressed!

We were referred to Collins plumbing by our neighbor and we couldn't have been happier with the work. Sean replaced our old galvanized pipes with new, properly sized copper pipes.

The pricing was reasonable and communication was great - from the initial estimate through the completion of the project.

Sean finished the job in the time he estimated and with high quality. If any friends or family ever need plumbing work I would 100% recommend Collins.

Excellent service, excellent punctuality, excellent pricing.  Just the best!  Called them, next morning they showed up and told me what to buy; had every ready next morning, fast and easy installation and in no time the new toilet was installed.

Terrible experience with these guys. Had them come in because we suspected a leak on our property. They assured us there was NO LEAK and all we needed was a $600 pressure regulator and a $2100 new water heater. They said the sound of leaking water in our walls was just air. LOL. They would of known we had a leak if they had done the most basic thing of checking our water meter which was spinning like crazy but no, just
air in our pipes. They took their $70 fee for their incompetent diagnosis and went on their way. We were no better off after the visit than before. We had a second plumbing company come in the next day and discovered the leak and fixed it the same day. If we had listen to these guys, we would have a $1000 water bill because apparently, we had NO LEAKS. LOL.

Great communication with the owner when I sent him a quote request via the Yelp app! Next day their knowledgeable tech, Brian, came out and explained the situation, the options and the solutions. We settled on one path. And the work got done and everything is working great thank you trenchless water solutions!

My 7 year old got a Pokemon stuck in our sink drain. I called and Ivan was able to squeeze me into his tight schedule. He was on time and fixed my drain in a timely fashion. I recommend their service. Professional, fast, reliable, and pricing was fair. Thanks again!

Ferdie was fast and very reliable. We had our sewer line replaced and he made it very seamless. He provided updates throughout the whole process and finished the job within a few days. Not only that, his quote for this job was very reasonably and far less than the other companies I previously reached out to. I highly recommend him and will be reaching out to him should we have any other plumbing issues down the line.

I can't say enough great things about Sam! He is my go to for all our plumbing needs. He is super responsive and explains everything to you in detail. We have had him out to the house on multiple occasions and he always shows up on time and completes the work. Sometimes I just text him with questions and he responds immediately. He is the best!

I had a small but urgent plumbing job on a Saturday: my tenants who live downstairs from me could not turn off their shower. I was out of town for the day and they had to turn the water off at the main, and then they had to leave for the day. I posted a request on Yelp. Rene was the first to reply and he said he'd come right out. I directed him how to open our lock-box and get the house keys, and he turned the shower off. He said the shower mechanism was shot, because putting in a new cartridge didn't solve the problem. So we will have to replace the mechanism. That's for Monday. Although he had driven from San Rafael, he only charged me $110 for the job. Great service.

Just got bait and switched by an unethical plumbing company.  Rooter Hero (should be rooter zero) gave me a coupon on my newspaper for a $77 drain clean, then came out ant told me that the quote was actually going to be $279.  The plumber asked to see the coupon and then said that coupon is only for easy access and told me that my tub was not easy access.  I have a standard tub  with a simple drain?? so not sure why he thinks I am going to let him charge me 3x the quote. I told him no thanks and he said ok then you owe me $45 for a dispatch fee.  I said good luck collecting that and ushered him out of my house.  Scammers!  steer clear of this company

I had a leaky shower head, so had to replace Delta cartridge. Tech came in and assessed situation, followed up with a quote for $770, including new trim at $550 and cartridge at $220). I called office and since I do not need new trim, i instructed them to order cartridge that I knew was about $75 from Delta, but figured with labor - that would be fine. A month later part arrived. Tech informed me that original quote was at 50% off since was quoted with new trim at full price (nowhere indicated on the quote)., so was going to charge $550. Silly me asked to also replace garden hose bib, a $10 item, was charged $189, so miraculously we still came to the magic number of $735. I will never use again and would warn others against using these rip-off artists.

P.S. Contrary to what owner suggests happened in his comments - the charge of $735 still sits on my credit card. There was no offer to adjust bill - neither by the tech (well, he did adjust from $220 to $550 for previously quoted work) nor by the head office afterwards - and they know how to find me if they would like to offer a partial credit. And additional work ($10 hose bib for which I paid $189) was on top of $550, so can't account for increase. As I mentioned before: hardly $100 in parts and over $600 in labor for a 40 minute appointment for very simple work.

P.P.S. And to tell you about the quality of the work: the garden hose for which source bib was replaced spews water everywhere because tech could not even bother to replace a 5 cent rubber seal that goes between the bib and the hose (which I now need to find time to locate at a hardware store and replace myself). Nor did he re-seal calking around the shower regulator, something that I too will have to do on my own.