Every spring and fall the same job comes around. The storm panels go in, or the screens come out, and somebody ends up on a ladder in the driveway while someone else holds the bottom rung. If that somebody is you, the question is not whether the job is hard. It is how many windows, how many trips up and down, and whether anyone else is going to show up for the swap.
Local option: New Plan Care gives families in the St. Louis area in-home help so a parent can stay home: companionship, help with bathing and dressing, meals, and overnight care. Call (314) 405-0887.
Count the windows and the trips
Walk the house once and write down every window that needs a storm panel or screen, and whether it sits on the ground floor, the second floor, or above a porch roof or bulkhead. Ground floor windows take a few minutes each. Upper windows take a tall ladder, a second person, and a careful reach. Then double the trips, because you go up for the install and come back for the removal in the other season. That number is the real labor, and it is the number you compare against the installer's time on site.
Check the tools and the ladder
Do you own a ladder that reaches the sill without standing on the top step? Is the ground level enough to hold it steady? Do you have a driver that fits the panel clips, a putty knife for old caulk, and a flat place to lay the panels so they do not warp? If you have to buy or borrow any of this, add it to your side of the ledger. If the installer brings their own, ask what the trip costs them to include and whether the old screens leave with them or stay in your garage.
Ask the installer the questions that matter
Ask whether the quote covers removing the old units, cleaning the sills, and reinstalling in the other season, or only one visit. Ask who handles a panel that cracks in transit, and whether that falls under their workmanship or the manufacturer's warranty. Ask how long the warranty runs, and get the answer in writing next to the quote. An install-only line is not the same as an install, remove, and store line. Those are two different jobs, and only one of them comes back in six months.
Decide who holds the screens
The part that never gets written down is storage. Where do the screens go in the off-season, and who knows where they are? A labeled bin in the garage, numbered by window, saves a lost Saturday later. If you are the one who stores them, you are also the one who has to find them. Put that on the list too.
Compare the two columns
Make two columns. In the first, write your side: the windows times the trips, plus the time to buy or borrow tools, plus the hours you lose waiting on a sibling who said they would hold the ladder. In the second, write what the installer's visit covers, including removal, storage, and the warranty. Then ask the question that usually decides it: does anyone in the family have the height, the steadiness, and the free afternoon to do the upper windows safely? If the answer is no, the hire column wins even when the numbers look close.
If you are still deciding who to call, the Local help page lists where to start in the St. Louis area. The work does not shrink by waiting for the next season, so pick the column you can keep doing, and write the decision in the group text so nobody has to guess who is on the ladder.