Lizzie Post is the great-great-granddaughter of etiquette author Emily Post and president of The Emily Post Institute. Needless to say she’s seen her fair share of dilemmas when it comes to etiquette around the home.

To kick off a new series, here she responds to a classic, and hotly debated, etiquette topic: shoes on or off in someone else’s home? She also dives into how to appropriately let a contractor know when you won’t be accepting his or her bid — a situation where silence is not golden.