16. Contractor Took Money And Ran

Our Contractor Took Money And Ran

I think I have mentioned here and there we got into trouble with our house flip.

I don’t even know how often I have started writing this post explaining the setbacks during a rehab/flip or what happened and I quit because I make myself angry. But the heck with it. I need to continue this blog.

How Bad Was It?

Really bad… but it could have been a lot worse… So I will not go into details but the gist of it is that he told us he was licensed to do electrical, plumbing and insulation. He wired and did plumbing without a license, and without a permit, and afterward, he put up sheetrock, mudded painted and went on his merry way.

Know the signs of impending doom!

I started noticing he started to cut corners with materials and started getting the cheapest of the cheap. It is funny how this works. It is not something you abruptly notice and can put a stop to.

For a while I keep asking if we can use this grade, that grade, does it fit in our budget… “No no no, I didn’t budget it for that finish“. The more shortcuts, and no longer the best quality floors, and then subway tiles in the bathroom. When he told me that we only have a budget for 25 dollars per square foot for kitchen granite, I suddenly woke up.

I was not happy. Yet I didn’t really tell him anything. Then suddenly he completely changed. He became huge dick after an email he wrote to me.
“I need to re-evaluate this whole thing, we are severely over budget“.

I respond with, how are we possibly over budget as you gave us a scope of work from the beginning and we are getting cheap materials?”

No answer.

Then I get this email:
“I am not coming to work anymore unless I am given 10K”, and then he gives me a list of work that justifies the 10K. And he charged my card 9.5K without being authorized. Yeah, that sick bastard Contractor Took Money And Ran!

Only after this, we found out he had no electrical license, so as you can imagine, it is a mess.

I do not want this post to be about the mess we are/were in. I just want to give you all an update and move on to better things…

Has this happened to you?

Well, I did some searching and found a few articles that may help.

(of course, this is just BS and I am just writing this section because google forces me to give out external links for SEO purposes!) Did I mention I am a god when it comes to SEO?

Don’t believe me?

Do a google search for “We buy houses in Connecticut“.. and check it out. We are the only site with mini-site links ORGANICALLY. Yeah kneel before me and worship my SEO skillz!)

Some SEO Filler…

OK OK back to the forced pretending I want to help out getting you resources.

HERE damn google. Now rank me

• Contractor Ran and took my damn money!
• what can you do when a contractor takes your deposit and runs?

OK back to ME! Thank you very much!

Of course, this is JUST a tip of the iceberg, the nipple on the tit, the head of the … well, you know what I am saying…

 

 

This is far from even half of it. But I would use up all my allowed space per post if I added more pics…

Onwards To Getting Filthy (rich)!

I was in no mood to write so I didn’t. Because of this, I have not touched my site in several months. I have no idea where I even rank. I hope I am still ranking one…
Either way, I have to pull through and continue working on dominating the web!

But I will just say this. The fight is far from over. I will get this son of a bitch but I can’t openly discuss how.

Anyways…

All we can do is fix the issues and sell this house ASAP!

So first we ripped out all the cheap flooring the previous contractor put in, and replace it with  a better product:

We ripped out the sheetrock, and redid electrical and plumbing:

       

Can you believe it after just a week of installing the bathroom tile, they started falling off on their own?

If this were to happen on flip or flop, or a fixer-upper, you would say “Ahh that is such crap, this is just intentionally added drama for TV dramatic effect“. NO! All this is REAL!

So…

We ripped out the tiling he did in the bathrooms and purchased new tiles (subway tiles again sadly), and that will be installed over the weekend.

We couldn’t proceed till electrical was redone. And we finally got it all redone.

So now granite has been ordered and templated and that will be installed in the next 10 days.

Meanwhile, we are redoing the deck, and the front railings while I have been focusing on the landscaping.

We salvaged the pavers that were probably over 30 years old buried under a foot of dirt. I took those and made a backyard patio.

Underneath all that brush is actually a paved walkway… underneath a foot of dirt roots and stumps!

Only issue was just before we finished the patio we found out there was a huge boulder in the way and we couldn’t remove it even with heavy machinery. So to cover that we are now making a fire pit. Clever huh?

And of course, we had to redo the deck.. again…

Water was coming into the garage when it rained so I installed a drain as well.

Well, this is just a draft. It is really late and I am tired. Will refine it tomorrow.

Speaking of tomorrow… New vanities are coming (the previous contractor seriously bought the cheapest crap you can find in Lowes…)

Will update this (and refine it) tomorrow.

Ughh…

I should be doing more SEO while this nightmare is ongoing but it is so hard to focus. I will try to force myself to set up a new city site for people in Ledyard CT that need to sell their house fast! While I keep my mind off things and get more leads and expand my area, I hope this will end up OK!

Anyhoo…

 

To make this article somewhat useful to you.. here is what I have learned.

• EVERYONE is evil. If you have not seen evil in someone you work with .. yet, trust me… things have simply not gotten bad enough for the evil to come out. But it is there! So always protect yourself!
• PAY WITH CREDIT CARD!!!!! I was fortunate to have paid this sick individual by credit card! Why? I won’t say, but it is easy to figure out!
• Do a reference search, do a license search, believe whatever people say.. sure, but always verify (license, permits, etc. etc.)
• Have a SOLID contract!