April 4th, 2010 | 
Author: I hear a lot of stories from friends about their renovations, never once have I heard that it was a wonderful experience that went smoothly. I thought I had just been better organized, now I realize I had just been lucky. Our perfect farmhouse, on the perfect acreage, in the perfect location is nothing more than a bank account sucking hog. The simplest of tasks in this house such as hanging curtains throw me into swearing fits. The studs in this place are 110+ year old oak that have aged and hardened over the years, my 18v electric screw driver is not a match for their strength. They have caused screw heads to snap off, some it is nearly impossible to drill into so I’ve been forced to move things to different locations and have patched more holes than I care to remember.
Our most recent project that we undertook was ripping out the old stairs and putting new ones in. The old ones were original to the house and well past their use by date. This project was met by multiple issues with the house not being square and incompetent unreliable contractors. I was told the stairs would take one week; six weeks in they still weren’t completed. When I questioned the guys doing the stairs I was met with every excuse in the book my favorite was always “it was more work than we expected”. Of course it is more work when you show up, spend an hour setting up and fiddling around, then work for two hours, pack up and leave for the day. Then there were the “my car broke down and I can’t come in today” excuses. That was soon followed by a screaming/swearing match on my front lawn by the two guys doing the work that resulted in one leaving and taking half the tools. With the stairs being such a major job we had to send the kids to my parents, when that stretched out to six weeks and I couldn’t see the end in site I had more than I could take, I just wanted my kids home. The contractors were fired and new ones brought in to try and finish up the mess the others left behind. Here we sit nearly two months later and the stairs are still not complete but are a lot closer than they were, we are now just waiting on the risers and trim to be painted.
This house also comes with issues that arise when fixing other issues. When the stairs came out we could see outside. The frame to the door on our upstairs balcony was rotting out. There was about a 4″ gap between the door frame and the deck that was letting water, leaves, wasps and cold air come rolling through the house. On the bright side we were able to replace the door and in one month brought our heating bill down by over $100.
All whining aside, I do love this house and the transformation from an outdated tired little farmhouse to what it is today makes me extremely happy. I may be broke but at least I have a fabulous house to hang out in!
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Your story sounds like I had the brother working on my house here in Miami. We had a similar experience where we decided to convert an entertainment room to a master bedroom, replace the tile floors to stone and up date our kitchen & bathrooms. The project was expected to take 6 weeks or so. We reviewed & signed the contract, paid the interior decorator, & she brought in the GC by the name of David Kalthoff from the Construction Project LLC. The GC disappeared for 6 months (maybe took a vacation) then came by later with the notice of commencement and said that getting the permits and plans took that long? The work began while they tore down walls and installed floors we were living in the house until we had to move out because of the dust. Every time I came by to check on the work the A/C was running while they cut stones and dust flying all over the house. I complained several times and they said they would not run the air but they always did behind my back while I wasn’t there. The GC would never give me the invoices to the subcontractors and I would tell him I was stopping the project till he gave me the invoices and proof of payments, but he would say that if I stopped the project all the subs would move on to their next jobs and who knows when we’ll see them again? Also his wife was deathly ill in the hospital spitting up blood and she was the one who handles the receipts. Once she came out she would give them to me. 6 months later all was complete except for the kitchen & bathroom cabinets in which he claimed would arrive next week. Next week came and no cabinets. Reason…finish trims were taking longer than expected. After fighting and battling for 5 months for the cabinets to be done we decided to pay a visit to the cabinet maker and you guessed it. No cabinets had been started even after we paid $15,000.00 down payment. We also paid $6,000.00 for the marble counter tops and the GC made a $2,000.00 deposit and kept the rest for himself. I fired the CG and had to finish the bathroom with the help of a friend also a CG. The GC filed a Lien against my home and never paid all the other sub-contractors who also filed liens. I am in the process of dealing with all through the Board of Architects and building inspectors. To top it all off he never pulled permits except for the windows we decided to add to the project during demolition phase. This is the short version of the nightmare.