Usacomplaints.com » Construction & Repair » Complaint / Review: Lone Star Remodeling - Lone Star Remodeling - Gary Hartman Inattention to Detail, Shoddy Craftsmanship. #611338

Complaint / Review
Lone Star Remodeling
Lone Star Remodeling - Gary Hartman Inattention to Detail, Shoddy Craftsmanship

The two words I would use to describe Lone Star Remodelingis incompetent and careless. Mywife and I just finished a 14-week kitchen remodel with Lone Star (15 weeks ifyou count our having to hire at our expense an outside appliance installer toproperly install our electric stove) and it has been one of the most unpleasantexperiences of my life. Theinattention to detail is pervasive throughout the company and runs from itsowner Garry Hartman to his field supervisor and down to his workers.

The problems with Lone Star began with the cabinets. Garry Hartman is an authorized dealerof Brandom Cabinets and sold us on these by claiming these were all-woodcabinets and possessed superior construction and materials. The first problem with the cabinets wasthat Garry Hartman ordered the wrong sized cabinet. Our kitchen plan called for a 36-inch wide appliance pantryto go in next to our ovens. Asconstruction progressed, we noticed that the placement of light switches wouldput them behind our appliance pantry. That is when we realized that the wrong sized cabinet had beenordered. The workers were workingoff of a plan that called for a 30-inch wide cabinet a big difference. Lone Star had to re-place the order andessentially buy a second appliance pantry at their expense. This change to our order further delayed the construction ofour cabinets. What was supposed tobe a three-week turnaround turned into six weeks. When the cabinets finally arrived, they were some of thecheapest constructed cabinets I had ever seen (similar in quality to thosebookshelves you buy at discount stores and assemble at home) and the paintedfinishes on them were horrible. Almost every painted joint on every door was cracked, the insides ofsome cabinets had so little paint applied that you could see bare wood beneaththem and one cabinet had someones footprint on the inside. The cabinets were primarily constructedof fiberboard and were assembled using plastic braces and staples. I was appalled. So too was Brandom Cabinets field supervisor. He personally came to our house and sawhow poorly the cabinets were finished and apologized profusely to us. To his credit, he took all of thecabinets back and credited Lone Star Remodeling for all charges. When I questioned Garry Hartman on how cheaply constructedthe cabinets were, he told me that he was mislead by Brandom on theirconstruction materials and technique. I dont believe this on two accounts; first, I had been told that LoneStar Remodeling had just installed Brandom cabinets in another customersbathroom, so they had to have known what they looked like and secondly, as anauthorized dealer of Brandom cabinets (and someone who stood to make a nicesales commission on the cabinets he sold us), Garry Hartman should have hadintimate knowledge of the product he was selling. We ended up having our kitchen cabinets custom-madelocally. We decided to do thisbecause we felt we would have better visibility over the quality of constructionand finishes. We gave Lone StarRemodeling the go-ahead to have these cabinets made at an additional cost of$6,000 added to our contract price. On my first visit to the cabinet maker, I was distraught to learn thatGarry Hartman had given him instructions to make a 30-inch wide appliancepantry the same exact mistake Garry Hartman had made before with the Brandomcabinets. I could not believe thatany one person could have been so careless. Thankfully, that mistake got corrected in time. After 4 additional weeks (and 10 weeksafter the initial demolition of our kitchen), our cabinets were finally readyto be installed. The painting ofthe cabinets took an additional 2 weeks and was done in our house after thecabinets had been installed. But the cabinet story does not end there. We were having a hutch-like cabinetbuilt in our breakfast room, with a base cabinet and 36-inch tall uppercabinets. Again, Garry Hartmanordered the wrong sized cabinet, and we ended up with a 42-inch tall cabinetthat made the hutch look disproportionate and caused issues with theinstallation of the crown moulding in the room. We accepted the larger cabinet because after living for 10weeks in our bedroom (our living room and dining room were full of boxes ofkitchen stuff), we couldnt stomach any more delays. I really could not believe that any one person could be soinattentive to detail. This wasthe third mistake Garry Hartman had made in ordering our cabinets. Lone Star Remodeling also tiled our kitchen floor. This job was botched. They did not level the floor prior tolaying tiles and subsequently had many tiles that were laid unevenly next toeach other. We made Lone StarRemodeling replace several of the tiles, but there are still instances where wecannot roll our vacuum cleaner over the floor without an uneven edge stoppingthe vacuum. We have alreadynoticed that some tiles have chipped on their edges because of the unevenness. Lone Star Remodelings field supervisor and one of theirworkers did the plumbing for our dishwasher, sink and disposal. I had to show one of the workers thathe had installed the water lines over the hose to our pull-out faucet and hadpinned it against the back of the cabinet. This prevented the hose from retracting properly. You would think that an installer wouldmake sure that something as basic as a pull-out faucet operated properly, butthat was not the case. Had I notpointed this out, he would have left it as is. Two days later, when we were moving back into our kitchenand putting things under the sink, I noticed that there was standing waterinside my cabinet. At this point, Lone Star Remodeling hired a third-party plumbing contractor to come and fixthe leaks. It took two plumbersfour hours to fix the problem. Theplumbers actually sawed-out all of the existing plumbing and redid it fromscratch.in trying to install our electric cooktop, Lone StarRemodeling scratched the stainless steel trim ring that encircles thecooktop. Garry Hartman insiststhat this was done during shipping, but the cooktop installer that weultimately hired to install the stove said otherwise, stating it was obviouslyscratched by Lone Star Remodelings workers. Lone Star Remodeling opened the box that the cooktop camein, removed the cooktop from the box and then removed the protective film overthe stainless steel that protected it during shipping. At no time did they notice any damagefrom shipping. It was only when Icame in my kitchen to inspect the backsplash being installed that I saw thedamage. I noticed because LoneStar Remodelings workers had tools and a bucket of grout sitting on ouruncovered and unprotected cooktop. Lone Star Remodeling could not figure out how to fasten thecooktop to my counters, but they wired the stove to power and told me I coulduse it in the meantime. I laterfound out that the cooktop was not installed properly. For plywood cabinets, a heat deflectorneeds to be installed (this tidbit of information was displayed prominently onpage 1 of the installation instructions) and Lone Star Remodeling did not dothis. They were telling me it wasalright to use a stove that was installed improperly and was a potential firehazard. At this point I took nochances and hired my own contractor to properly install the cooktop (which Idid at my own expense.) These are the major items that went wrong during thisconstruction process but everyday was filled with other screw-ups that wouldnot have been fixed had I not pointed them out. The workers sheetrocked over a recessed lighting fixture, sheetrocked over our vent hood exhaust, left tape and paint on our kitchenfloor, left visible holes in the sheetrock around light switches, installed mycrown moulding so sloppily that they didnt meet in the corners there was agood one-half inch difference in where they met. (They had all intentions of leaving it like this as theyputtied it as it was and were going to paint it that way.) The wall paintingwas done carelessly and many spots were left not properly painted. They installed our phone and cable TV jacksin one of the most sloppy, unprofessional manner I have ever seen. I have since redone that in a properway myself. And finally, theyconstantly left the worksite messy and dirty. All of the other subcontractors that worked on our job were steadfastabout cleanliness. Not Lone StarRemodeling. I found out through the third party contractors that LoneStar Remodelings long-time field supervisor recently passed away. His replacement, I was told, was atalented fellow but he quit to take a job as maintenance supervisor with alarge company. My wife and I wereone of the first jobs to be handled by the current supervisor. It is obvious that this man does nothave the skill set of his predecessors. Finally, right after my remodel job ended and Lone StarRemodeling removed their things from my garage, my 55 piece socket wrench setwent missing. I do not have proofthat Lone Star Remodelings employees stole it, but considering Ive had thatset for over 10 years and it suddenly went missing seems beyond coincidence. If you dont consider the poor flooring job and some missedspots with the wall painting, the rest of my kitchen now looks fine. This is a testament to theprofessionals that Lone Star Remodeling subcontracted with. Lori Allen of Lori Allen Designconvinced us to rethink our original design plan and she couldnt have beenmore right. Our kitchen is bright, airy and open. Miguel Arizola ofArizola Carpentry built our kitchen cabinets and he is a true artist andcraftsman. Corbett Thompson of Cand K Painting painted the outsides of our kitchen cabinets and did a naturalstain on the inside. They arebeautiful. Glenn Martin of Stoneand Wood Concepts did our granite countertops and granite windowsills. It is almost impossible to find theseams between the pieces of granite they fused together. Finally, the fellows at AlliancePlumbing came in and transformed a disarrayed jumble of leaky kitchen plumbinginto a neat and watertight system. I would highly recommend each of these professionals. I cannot recommend Lone Star Remodeling. Their inattention to detail isfrustrating and time consuming. Work has to be redone two or three times before it's right. Theworkers require constant supervision and correction; otherwise they will besatisfied leaving you with substandard work. The amount of time and effort that you would have to investto insure that Lone Star Remodeling is doing their job properly would be betterspent serving as your own general contractor and using the fine subcontractorsI mentioned above.


Offender: Lone Star Remodeling

Country: USA
Phone: 2814807676
Site:

Category: Construction & Repair

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