In October of my wife and I began the process of building a new home. We entered into a contract with Rock Pond Developers and Electrical Contractors, Inc. After having been interested in a home that they had built in a neighboring town. That house being too large, we opted to build a custom.
As constuction began, all seemed to be moving smoothly from groundbreaking through initial framing. Then, the problems started. The framing subcontractor had a tendency not to show up every day, as did the General Contractor (Mr. Tremblay). He claimed that he had other work to attend to in Massachusetts, or that there were family obligations, etc.
Subsequently, the roof sheathing was not installed in time to prevent several snow storms from depositing a fair amount of snow inside the structure. At this point, we had to listen to excuses that the schedule was slipping because the framers had to shovel snow for half a day before they could work.
This continued through the winter with progress slowing to a crawl. We had sold and moved from our previous residence and were renting a home nearby with a six-month lease. This lease was to expire at the end of April with no possibility of extension.
With this in mind we attempted to keep pressure on Flip to get the new house move-in ready by the end of April.in response to our demands, work would cease for a week at a time. The more we pushed, the less that was done. So, we would back off a little.in doing so, Flip would make a feeble attempt to be on site with an apprentice for 2-3 hours, 3-4 days of a given week. However, this would quickly taper off, again with the excuse that there were other jobs to be attended to. This continued for months.
When we pressed him to expain why he couldn't have someone working at our home full-time, we often received answers like, "it is a very complicated house and is going to take time", or, "I am losing money by spending so much time there." "I can be making money doing the other jobs." We continued to argue, but it was a waste of time and energy.
In sum, we ended up moving into an unfinished home on August 1, some three months later than originally discussed. The home was finished enough to obtain a certificate of occupancy, but not to the point where we could finish moving in.
There weren't and still aren't any racks in any of our closets to hang or store clothing. Each of the ten rooms and all other areas received only one coat of paint, and primer is showing in many areas. Our front porch and balcony were left mostly unpainted with some primer, exposed to the elements to be destroyed, numerous areas inside the house were damaged during construction and never repaired.
The metal chimney pipe was to have a chase built around it to make it blend with the exterior of the home and this wasn't done. Now we have a bright steel pipe protruding 12 feet into the air from the rear of our house. There was no landscaping done other than an initial loam and seed which was washed away in torrential rains shortly after it was spread. Flip promised to return after the rain had stopped and make the necessary repairs, but again, he failed to show up. He has refused to make any of the required repairs, including the installation of a door required by our town's building code, until paid in full.
We are currently being sued by Rock Pond Developers for withholding what small amount ($11,639) of our construction loan funds were left in an attempt to get the above items and many others remedied by another contractor. The stress and frustrations from dealing with Rock Pond (Flip Tremblay) have been tremendous and I would not wish our situation on anyone.
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