Before you hire Trinity Custom Homebuilders out of Ellijay, Georgia to build your home in Georgia, Alabama, Tenn, or North Carolina... READ THIS.
We wanted to hire them to build our house. They suggested that we go through SunTrust Bank for the loan so we did. All finances were supposed to be worked out because they break the project down by each little individual thing that they do. They said that they estimated HI and we should have plenty of money to turn back in or do landscaping or whatever we wanted. They said that it never took them any longer to build a house than 120 days.
First thing that happened is they assign a superintendent for the job and he was supposed to call us and get with us and discuss where we wanted the house and to give us details on how it works. Well we waited nearly 4 weeks and never heard from him. When we called to ask when they were supposed to start, they were surprised to hear that he never contacted us. When they questioned him he said that he called us on our cell phone several times and couldn't get in touch with us. At the time, we didn't even have a cell phone. That should have been the first red flag as to what kind of company this was. When he finally did meet with us, he said that it never took him anymore than 120 days to complete a house. We told our landlord that we would be out in 160 days which would give us an extra month in case of problems. 78 days and they hadn't even started. I had to continuously write emails to the main company just to get anything going what-so-ever.
When they finally did start on it, they had so many screw ups it wasn't funny. Our property is a hill and there was one little flat spot in the middle of the property. The superintendent told us that the house wouldn't be a tall house that the flat spot was just enough to build it where it would look normal. AND they wouldn't have to take out too many trees. Because the superintendent was never out here and didn't tell the excavators what to do they did the best that they could with no information. So they graded off our flat spot where the house was going to go. Then they took out all of our trees around the house. Then they dug the footers and because they didn't have a superintendent on the job, they dug someone elses footers on my property. When I questioned that it looked smaller, he said that it always looks that way, when in reality he had never been out there to look at it. A month later, he showed up and it was wrong. So they hired someone else to come and regrade and dig footers AGAIN. Then they poured the concrete into the footers. When the city came to inspect, they said that it held water so they wouldn't pass it. The inspectors told me that it had rained and if they were supervising like they should have been or they did what they were supposed to do that they would have covered them up with plastic. So they had to REPOUR the footers. Making my already tall house that wasn't supposed to be tall, even taller. Now the framers came to frame and they couldn't do the garage because the footers weren't right on that either. So they had to get someone else out here to dig that and repour. Now keep in mind that everytime they did something to the house, it would be another month without anyone coming out to do anything again. But if you were to call the superintendent he would always say they are supposed to be out tomorrow. I can't tell you how many times I heard that.
Now... It was discussed at the signing of the contract that we would be able to talk to the electrician and tell him where we wanted the outlets as I was going to add a small beauty shop in one of the rooms and I wanted the outlets in certain places. When I talked to him, he was very rude and said that he had been jumped on by the "head boss" the prior week for doing something that the customer wanted but the company wouldn't let him do anything different than EXACTLY what was on his sheet because they wanted to get $400 extra dollars out of you for a change order. I didn't want a change order. That is the way it was supposed to be from the very beginning before we signed the contract. When we went to their sales person that sold us the house she said that she would talk to them. The next day he told us that he was going to get it done for us (like it was a favor) and he was going to make it look like the framers messed it up and charge it to them. They told us that we would be in the house the end of Aug and they had barely broke ground. Then he said that he would have us in in Oct. So we told the landlord our expected due date to move. The owners sold the house leaving us no where to go and the new house wasn't anywhere close to being finished.
Thankfully the new owners said we could stay there till Thanksgiving and then they had to have the house. So the superintendent said there would be no problem for us getting in by then. End of Oct came and no one had shown up to do anything in over 2 weeks. Again, if you called the superintendent he would tell you that they were supposed to be there tomorrow, that is if you called him from a number that he didn't recognize in order to get him to answer. It got to the point to where we didn't even bother calling because we knew he was going to lie... Again. Finally end of Nov came and we had to leave. At the last moment he had 2 dozen people in that house trying to get everything done in one day. And you can imagine how that worked out. So the superintendent said that it was done enough to move in and gave us permission but said that the workers would be there that week to finish. No one ever showed up. 2 months went by and no one ever showed up. We continuously called the superintendent leaving messages but he wouldn't answer and if you left a message, he would never call back. When my husband finally called from a number that he wasn't familiar with he answered and said that they couldn't finish the house because it was in the contract that after we move in that we accept the house as it is. The appliances were a different story. We were supposed to be able to pay a little extra money and get the dishwasher of our choice. They put the cheap dishwasher in and never said a word to us. The "head boss" from the main office assured me that it was a great product and that he had never had any complaints about the appliances. So I trusted him. He seemed rather trusting but then on the other hand so did the superintendent when you talked to him face to face. We soon learned that he was a liar and had no credibility. AFter the appliances were installed I asked could I begin using them and he told me that they were "good to go". For 2 and 1/2 weeks I tried to wash dishes and they came out the same as they went in but dried on. It was obvious it wasn't right. I called and called and called the superintendent and he never answered nor would he call back if I left a message. I finally wrote the company an email and never heard a word so I called someone to come and look at it for me.By this time, I was pretty upset that I couldn't get the superintendent to call me back or even acknowledge my call. The technician that came to look at it said that it wasn't even put together right and he fixed it. He stayed to watch them wash. They came out clean. So I called the "head boss" from the main office and told him that I had written an email and that not to worry because I had someone look at it and fixed it. He said that was good because he was going to send someone to look at it himself.
Well... Another month passed and they never did anything to the house. They left the fireplace logs unassembled and 1/2 of the screen had not been put back on and none of them were even cleaned. The interior wall outlet sockets all had holes in them where the dry wall guys puttied over the sockets completely and the electrician was such a jerk that he knocked HUGE holes in the wall to install the electrical things in. So there were holes that hadn't been fixed. The inside looked polkadotted because there were spots all over the house that hadn't been painted. We went without a mirror in one of the bathroom for 2 months. They said that the house came with shelves in all the closets but there were 2 closets that they didn't put any shelves at all. There were several squeeks in the floor, and one really bad one. It is almost like 2 or 3 rotten pieces of wood rubbing against the wall and it sounds like it is going to fall in. The plumbing had a loud ear piercing hum to it everytime you turned water on in the house. They finally did fix that after 2 months. They didn't cover the bathtubs up nor were they very careful with how they were treated during the construction and they are scratched like crazy and all them had big holes in them that leaked really bad when you took a shower. I kept telling them that they need to get that taken care of immediately but again the superintendent would never return my calls upon leaving many, many messages. The countertops had some kind of glue on them that I couldn't get off and the floor was scratched really bad. When the superintendent came to do a punchout list (1 and mo. Later) with us I told him about these things and his answer was for me to go to Walmart and get me some goofoff and that should take it right off or would give me the name of someone to come and fix it for me at my expense. When the superintendent came for the punchout list I asked him when he was going to get this stuff done. Other stuff included 4 huge mounds of dirt and tree stumps and tree logs still in the front yard along with some bricks and other garbage thrown throughout the yard. He said that he left the garbage and all that stuff because we had asked him to. That was so UNTRUE. When they cut the trees down we had asked him how long would they be there and if we could cut a few pieces out of one log to get some firewood in which we did that the first weekend they were down. Those trees sat in the yard for 9 months. Then he sent someone to my house and wanted me to pay them nealry $4,000 to clean the mess up because we were out of money in our account. I told him "no, that I would go get an attorney, that it was his responsibility to do that and if he had been doing his job and supervising that he would know that the other guys didn't take it off before he paid them. After the mention of the attorney, he stumbled around and said that he had someone coming out to clean it all up and grade the land and fix the drive way and he was going to make it look like we had more money in our account than we really did. I preceded to tell him that if he hadn't screwed every inch of the house up that there would be plenty of money left to do what they said they were going to do in the first place (like the drive way). All he could talk about was closing on the house. I told him that we weren't closing until it was completed. He informed me that the "head boss" from the main office said that he wasn't going to do anything else for us because I made him mad about the dishwasher.
Well I am sorry. This isn't personal. This is business and sometimes with a business you have to do whatever it is to make the customer happy. I have my own business and I have done that many many many times. Not this company. They don't care. They are working with the bank and the bank gives them whatever they want. We had NO CONTROL over the money that we signed for. We were cheated on the drive way too. They were supposed to put the big rock down for the big trucks to pack down and then at the end they budgeted in our budget to put 2 other kinds of rock down so we could get up the driveway with no problem. For 2 and 1/2 months we couldn't get up our driveway when it rained because they had not done anything to the drive way and it had big ruts in it. So finally one of the subcontractors saw what we were going through and felt sorry for us and talked to him and got us some gravel out here. They refused to put the 3rd rock down that they charged us for by saying that they never do that.
Well it was funny that when we were making plans to do this they told us that they did and that they build houses on hills that go straight up and ours wasn't that steep so they budgeted in our construction loan to do that. So now we can't get up our driveway wet or dry. We have to get a running start and our car now has an oil leak and the engine light is on and when we have company, they have to park at the bottom of the hill. They budgeted $1500 for the drive way that they spent every bit of $500 on, but because the superintendent was never there to supervise and there were so many screw ups, now they took the money out of our drive way fund. Basically we paid for the screw ups. So we paid for his inefficiency. The fireplace was never painted because it was going to cost us $150. When I asked why I was told that when the painter has to come back to the job site that he charges $150. I said that wasn't my fault and he replied that I had started painting it and that is why he didn't paint it. That is not the way it was. When the painter was here, the fireplace mantel was not even up yet, nor was the door leading to the garage. I only started painting it because I didn't think that the painter would be back out and I was right. I stopped painting because they use this really cheap material and the paint absorbed it to the point that it never covered. So I stopped. Then the painter told me that is why they spray it. That is why it costs $150. So now the superintendent called today trying to intimidate my husband and tell him that they are going to put a lean on the house and we need to get it closed out fast because the construction loan was up at midnight tonight.
I called an attorney and he advised me to not give them another penny and not to sign anything till it was done. Now he wants to send 50 people here in the morning so we will sign the papers tomorrow night. See, the superintendent went to the head office every Tue and so we knew that we usually got a call saying that he was going to do something the following week but of course no one ever showed up. It became a joke within our household that Wed we knew we were going to get a call and Thur no one would show up. And I even called the bank to tell them about it and they didn't care. They just give Trinity what they want. I could not get anyone to help me at all. This is their investment too, you would think that they would want it done right but they don't care. After all I have been through with this company, I bet someone is getting paid under the table to turn their heads. Then another problem was we have asked the superintendent to give us a copy of the break down 5 times and all five times he says that he has it unles we see him face to face and then he left it somewhere. We still haven't gotten it. For all we know, this company could be taking our material and building an addition on to their house with my material paid for out of my account. Maybe that is why they said that we were out of money along with all their screw ups that I am sure we were charged for. Still to this day have never received the breakdown of expenses.
So I advise anyone that if you are looking into this company, no matter how logical and great they seem in the beginning, if I were you I would pick a different company. I would go to the county engineering office and ask them for advice on builders and then I would interview them. They know what builder passes all inspections and who does the best work and who does it when they are supposed to and they see all the complaints on all the builders so they know who is good and who isn't. They also warned me in the beginning about this company and by that time we had already signed the contract and paid them $300 and we just said that we would deal with it. If only I had listened and changed builders.
Melody
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