Al Pen Construction

Allen and I had sat down prior to the start of the project and very thoroughly went through the details of work – where walls would go, where features would sit, what he would do/provide versus what my spouse and I were responsible for. Allen made these changes to a digital version of the plans when I was in his office immediately prior to signing the contract. I had failed to get a printed copy of the final prints and specs because he was having trouble printing them. I trusted him at that point and was confident the project would go smoothly. I soon came to regret this, though, because when he started work he used an older version with many discrepancies. Beyond this, there were multiple instances when my spouse and I found unsatisfactory work: significant gaps between the 2x6’s holding up a major beam he had installed such that only one or two of the vertical 2x6s were actually in contact with the beam, cutting the roof rafter adjacent to the dormer, not putting a ledger/deck board to support the three sides of the tub per manufacturer requirements, and using a vent hose that was not rated for dryers for our dryer vent. In the first three instances, Allen did fix the issue after we pointed it out. However, we replaced the vent hose ourselves without pointing it out to him because at that point in the project we wanted to interact with Allen as little as possible. There were many other instances when the work was unsatisfactory (crooked doorways and walls in the dormer and addition that were not tied into the original house therefore were not the result of issues with the existing structure, etc.) but we chose to pick our battles. There were many instances when Allen tried to get us to pay more money beyond that which we had agreed to (e.g., saying the dormer would need more support/piers into the basement, but when we questioned it he just dropped it). We did pay more money for electrical work, because we understand it was beyond ordinary conditions. But, in most instances, we just did more work ourselves. Allen always wanted to do things the easiest way possible. For instance, he wanted to put a bulkhead along the floor in the upstairs dormer/bathroom to run ductwork through. The ductwork had obviously been running in the eaves of the cape cod house originally, but he had not thought about where the duct would be running when we put together the initial plans so he wanted to put it in a bulkhead. My spouse and I ended up re-running the ducts ourselves. Allen was also routinely inconsiderate of our requests. For instance, he insisted that he had to keep two sections of our fence down for months because the gate 30 feet away was too far to walk. He knew opening the fence was a serious inconvenience for us because it kept our dogs locked in the house all day, but he did not seem to care about our concerns. We were fine with opening the fence occasionally for materials drop off/trash removal/etc. but we thought that would be the exception: not the norm. In the end, the final product was sufficient for what we had paid. But, that was mostly because we did a lot of work ourselves and because we pushed back on the most critical issues. I would never work with Allen again, and would recommend anyone working with him to have every detail of the plan very clearly documented in writing before beginning work. Do not trust that Allen will have your best interest in mind in instances of ambiguity, and expect that when he says “we’ll figure that out later” that his idea will either (1) require you to pay more or (2) be a substandard solution.