The Horrible Journey To Realization
I, too, had a journey with SEVERAL bad contractors who caused unthinkable damage to my home; were argumentative and irrational in their skewed brains; overcharged for shoddy workmanship; ignored their own contracts; denied liability; fought “tooth and nail” to avoid responsibility and to not pay for damages…. and the list goes on and on! Let us not forget the PSYCHOLOGICAL element that these bad guys play on your brain. They use every unethical tactic that they can muster to “trick” your logical thinking into somehow believing that it was your fault that they could not honor their agreements and just do their job correctly.All that any homeowner asks is that the work be done professionally and that the contractor simply behave in an ethical manner.Is this too much to ask? Apparently so, especially when the VAST MAJORITY of contractors are criminals, or were the “bad kid” in school who had to be shipped off to vocational school to learn to be a painter because the school system did not want to deal with his emotional outbursts, classroom disruption, and bullying..That same “bad kid” is now in your home.Thus, the problem with these bad guys is that they learned how to be manipulative, liars, and “street smart” THUGS who do not care about the very meaning of the word “ethical” because in their warped minds this is only for the “sissy white collar” people.NONE of the societal boundaries apply to them as far as they are concerned. They can ignore their promises, cause dangerous structural conditions to someone’s HOME and they can rob you blind of your savings… and they know that the legal system does not have the gumption to chase after all of these bad guys.And a reminder: MOST are bad. So, they know that they have the wave of big numbers of complaints working FOR them.My story:Phase I: the first contractor, Carl of “Morgan Clark” contracting located in Connecticut, was a smooth-talking, soft spoken, Con Man who came off as a “nice guy.”He lied his way into our lives after he put together a slick ad campaign in local newspapers depicting himself as a craftsman who truly cared about the quality of work he produced. He told us, in so many words, to ignore the fact that he did not have a lot of RESIDENTIAL experience because he was looking to change careers from being a “Commercial builder” to a “Residential builder.”HMMMM. That should have been a big red flag. But guess what? The homeowner is ALWAYS conned into believing the cunning words of such monsters and when they finally wake up from the trance that they have been put into…. it is often too late with time, money, and damages already a big factor.This is what happened to us. This horrible con man brought unqualified workers into our highly specialized and unique addition to our home where there was very little room for “rookie” carpenters. This was an expensive and highly skilled project and we needed good people to build to the architectural specifications.He then started to commit Larceny by overcharging us for projects that were not complete or not even started but he would sneak them into a complicated “flow chart” hoping that we would not notice or even know if something was not yet complete.To add to our expenses, we moved out of the home at his request so that he could get the project completed “faster.” No, this only gave him an excuse to go slower and without any oversight to the project [he apparently was NEVER at the job site.]The structural problems were so big, and the timeline he gave us to be complete in “16 weeks” was totally ignored. No framing was complete, and the roof was not installed– so we now had water damage over the course of the winter. After 8 months on the job, and being “led along” for way too long, I finally brought an architect in town to look at the mess that he was passing off as acceptable. The architect was appalled and I then fired this horrible, HORRIBLE con man in person [who refused to remove his dark glasses when I confronted him].We had paid this con man nearly $300,000 for work that was faulty, and most of it needed to be ripped down and re-done completely!To add insult to injury, after his much needed termination, he then puts a lien on our home for another $295,000!!!!!!!!This lien far exceeded the total cost of the job when added with the wasted $300,000 we had already paid him.He owed US a refund for overcharging us illegally for work not even done yet, and for certainly the bad work that needed replacement…. and now he wanted to really ‘twist the knife’ and shoot us the finger by putting a fraudulent lien on our home!We were stunned at the audacity. This was a retaliation in the worst order. Unthinkable abuse of a system that this web site has proved to be outrageously broken and causing harm to the economy but our legislatures are ‘bought off’ by a corrupt building system that pays no attention to ethics.Two of the four attorneys we approached to help us remove this fraudulent lien were so unconcerned and lazy regarding this matter that we were astonished once again. We were told to ignore the issue because the lien “goes away” after one year, and then we had one attorney drag his feet in filing the paper work to get the hearing in court to drop the lien…. the abuse by the very legal help you are seeking is frustrating beyond belief and is yet another insult to the homeowner/victim.After we fired the attorney we hired to help us, we then searched to find a young, aggressive attorney who would at least be motivated to help us. We did not know that we could appeal to the Title company [as one other writer told in his story.]We finally found a decent attorney who came to our home and did a walk through and was so angry at what he saw that he called the attorney who put the fraudulent lien on our home and demanded that his client drop the lien. This new attorney was forceful and convinced that this was outright fraud and told the other attorney that he would arrive in court with an ‘army of professionals’ to give detailed explanations of the damages to the Judge and that the bad contractor would most certainly be cited for fraud.The lien was dropped that day. After our waiting on a stupid attorney for FOUR months to drag his feet in simply filing paperwork [rather than bothering to look at the damages and become educated enough to make a forceful phone call].Thank God for the young, aggressive attorney we finally hired. We had a construction loan, and so we were really backed into a corner with the fraudulent lien because the loan payments were stopped until we got the lien dropped or ‘bonded out.’The homeowner suffers immeasurably with fraudulent liens. They get screwed on every side of the coin. The day that that good attorney got the lien dropped was a day that I will always remember. I slept well for the first time in several months. The stress that a bad home contractor can cause a person and a family cannot be emphasized enough.The local governments need to wake up and realize that this is costing the economy way too much in lost revenue. The money wasted on bad contractors [who don't bother to pay taxes] could be spent shopping in town, or properly contributing to the economy rather than being wasted.We took the bad contractor to court, and were given a judgement of $100,000. Guess what? The bad contractor then filed Bankruptcy and it turned out that the two spec houses he was building [by stealing money from us] also went into foreclosure. His own personal home is now in foreclosure. We were notified because the judgement was against him personally for fraud and we were able to put a lien on his personal home and his spec homes.We have never been able to collect. He has no assets as the homes in foreclosure have no equity in them.I was an Insurance Adjuster for a few years out of College, so I knew that I had to make a claim against his GL policy right away after we fired him.Thank God I did take the time to insist on filing a claim. However, a GL policy does not pay for shoddy workmanship or any mistakes whatsoever. It only pays for the ENSUING LOSSES [or secondary losses] that arise from the shoddy workmanship, such as water damage from water infiltration due to a roof being put on incorrectly, etc. The GL policy won’t pay for the shoddy roof job, but it will pay for all of the damages that result from that such as water damage, etc. Lesson learned: DEMAND “Errors and Omissions” Insurance coverage from EVERY contractor who wants to do work on your property. Also, demand that the contractor obtain a Performance Bond to protect you should he not give you good workmanship or skip out on the project all together. This is one sure way of ‘weeding out’ the bad guys because there is no way that they will be able to obtain such insurance.Now onto the horror we faced with REPLACING, REPAIRING, and FIXING every problem this horrible con man left for us to discover.To be brief, I will give you a small snapshot of the problems to be completely repaired:Illegal and dangerous electrical wiring… Illegal and dangerous plumbing work…. Illegal and violation to building code framing… Multiple areas of water infiltration…. Ignored the architectural plans and built things that were in violation of both the plans and of the building code…. Illegal and violation of code masonry…. Unfinished work that languished for months…. Every existing bathroom ripped out and destroyed without homeowner consent…. NO progress in the new addition, yet demolished the existing structure of existing home rendering it unlivable and ‘condemned’ by building officials until completely repaired…. No roof put on over new addition causing unspeakable water damage over several months….. Then the bad contractor rips off sections of existing roof for no apparent reason [and without homeowner knowledge] which causes even more water damage to now the existing home…. Un-grounding of the home electrical system which is both illegal and dangerous… Working illegally with power tools plugged into the existing home outlets that are not designed to have power tool loads…. Steals electricity from home existing electrical panel to heat a giant trailer on the property without the consent of the homeowner….. Wrong materials [cheaper substitutes] used without the consent of the homeowner….. Overcharging the homeowner in order to ‘float’ cash to his pockets before the homeowner realizes that the framing was not complete yet paid for in full; the chimneys not even near complete but charged in full…. and the list goes on and on and ON. Be forewarned! This can happen to any good citizen.We thought we had the right Engineer watching out for us, and we thought that we had hired all of the right people to protect us…. but it turned out that EVERYONE, and I do mean everyone from the Engineer, the new architect, and ALL of the new builders brought to our home to REPAIR the obvious damages left behind by the bad builder, were OUT FOR THEMSELVES AND TO MAKE AS MUCH MONEY FROM THIS TERRIBLE CIRCUMSTANCE AS POSSIBLE.I was at my wits end. And to add to this, please make note of the fact that ALL of the subsequent carpenters, painters, builders, etc., who were hired to HELP us would turn around and USE this terrible incident AGAINST us whenever we questioned any work that they did!Be careful here. The seemingly “nice” guy can turn caustic, nasty, and manipulating when he sees it to be in his best interest.We had many of these new people hired to help us use this horrible scene as a means to making money off of our train wreck.This was the most horrifying thing of all.We had a couple of people in particular who were terrible: the garage door maker had a signed contract to make and install the doors within six weeks. But he took six months! Six months!The same old sly manipulation was used: Give a big deposit, then another “installment” prior to the doors being delivered with a fake delivery date set in place… and now he has most of your money and “Voila!” he turned into the bastard that he truly is.Suddenly, it was my fault, the homeowner, that I was ungrateful for his efforts to make doors to certain specifications and that he had other ‘builders’ putting pressure on him to do big projects, etc. The excuses were inexcusable.But what did he do when I reminded him of his own contract and that he had violated it by not delivering within 6 weeks? He turned on me and accused ME, the homeowner, of ‘violating’ the contract for obscure, nonsensical reasons.He then demanded to be paid by “bank check” at the final delivery [which he kept moving up in order to play his con game]. His demand was for some idiotic reasoning that the homeowner might cancel the final check [which was a small amount and far less than what we had already paid.]This garage door maker, Gary of the Garage Door Company, AKA, The Automatic Door Company, was abusive, controlling, and in violation of any fair business law written.He knew it. But he used his knowledge of our having to fire the bad contractor a few months earlier as an EXCUSE that we must be the terrible homeowners because we had to fire a bad contractor!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!This insane, outrageous, illogical ‘mind twisting’ is what happens when you come across yet ANOTHER bad contractor who will use anything he can [even when it makes no sense] to use against an unsuspecting homeowner.Outrageous is too soft a word for this horrible abuse of the homeowner’s trust.To boot, he delivered a faulty product that we had to have repaired by a different door installer on an emergency basis. The doors were at least 400 pounds each, and were dangerously installed by the bad door maker. He knew he had installed something incorrectly that could have KILLED someone.He still, to this day, is a nasty bully who reduces himself to calling me derogatory names as a defense and is STILL using the bad contractor dismissal as a skewed way of distorting the character of the homeowner!Unthinkable.Be forewarned. The problems left behind AFTER you fire one bad contractor should only make you more cautious in who you hire to repair your precious home.This long story could be longer with ALL OF THE STORIES I could tell you about the bad guys who came to prey on us AFTER the firing of the bad General Contractor. But be aware that I am writing this to help ANY homeowner out there who cannot imagine how prevalent the problem is with dishonest contractors.Here is a list of the bad guys we had to battle to get our home done after the first bad guy was terminated, and to please be aware: 1.) Garage Door Maker: Overdue on delivery and installed incorrectly causing great physical danger to people on the property.2.) Bad Roofer: Did not properly supervise roof installation after promising homeowner he had ‘many good’ supervisors to send to make sure roof installed properly. The roof had several leaks and continues to have a big, slow leak that the roofer has refused to acknowledge or properly repair. Remember, if I had insisted on Errors and Omissions Insurance, I could collect for such negligence.3.) Bad painters: We fired two painters who wasted our expensive, imported paints and caused huge delays in the final closing of our home. Improper painting and lack of skilled labor.4.) Bad carpentry to repair the damages: We fired a contractor who made big promises to us to properly repair the framing but in the end was compounding some of the original problems.5.) Over charged and “raped” by large General Contractor: This big contractor called me one weekend as we were looking for someone to fix our home after we had just fired the bad contractor. Big mistake to listen to the siren song of this big contractor. He was only looking to charge ‘by the hour’ or what is called ‘time and material’ for his services and rape us even more with HUGE bills.6.) Unethical Engineer: This engineer was on board from the beginning and should have come to the homeowner with and urgent message that something was wrong with the bad builder’s lack of skill in building our home. Never looked out for us but sent us big hourly bills for his supposed services.7.) Unethical Architect: Tried to make the sexual moves on me during the most stressful period of my life, then would bang on the door of our rental unit at 8am on a Saturday to collect for the few hours he had worked that week. He demanded to be paid every week and would track me down to be paid in cash or with a check made to his name only in order for the ‘check to clear faster.’A cast of characters who were ALL out for themselves.I could not have imagined this terrifying ordeal if I had tried prior to living through it.Please be careful, all homeowners out there. You are on your own if you start out with the wrong team.Get a strong attorney and and Independent Project Manager to protect you from day one, prior to starting any project. DO NOT appear to be a push over or a “nice” person to anyone. Put your Poker Face on and be ready to play the role of BOSS over unruly children who could not assimilate through the regular school system.I hope my story helps everyone who reads it.Local Governments, WAKE UP. TAKE ACTION. Stop ignoring this huge issue within our society.-The End.- P.S. We did, finally, after 1.5 years, finish our home. We ‘hobbled’ across the finish line with an “okay” but not an “A+” carpenter to help us. I ended up painting much of my own home, and we ended up staining our own floors due to the stupidity of so many idiots we had to terminate.The cost of such dishonesty was enormous. And we still have a good carpenter we found who has to re-install some exterior doors that were incorrectly installed, and to help us insulate an exterior wall that was uninsulated! How did any of this pass inspection? You need to always be vigilant and get the proper people to watch for your best interests.God Bless the innocent homeowner.
