David Bishop

Do NOT believe a word David Bishop says. He will take your money, promise work and if you finally get someone to come out, some jobs will be poorly performed. Subs are not paid and while things may look good at first, you can bet it will fall apart within a year. We started a major reconstruction project in February 2013. He said he could finish in two to three months. This was a complete gut, major reconstruction and the addition of a pool. I moved in with no COO in December 2013 and had to go to court to pay a fine. The pool was dug in July 2013 and finally filled in April 2014. We’ve had nothing but problems. I went to the city to obtain the electrical permit. The man owning the permit was NOT the man doing the “work”. I had to call and threaten his license in order to get work completed. When switches are flipped power goes off in other areas. Breakers constantly trip. I have had a reputable electrical company review some of the issues. Without completely redoing the entire house they can’t isolate the problem. We had a plumbing problem and we contacted or attempted to contact the person we thought was the plumber. The owner company said they never worked our house. Apparently somebody from that company wasn’t representing the actual company. The steel doors won’t open/close properly. Bishop did not pay the door builder or shower doors installer. The pool began cracking in the fall of 2014. I contacted Bishop who finally came out and said the cracks were just surface nothing to worry about. After two years of HUGE water bills we paid $15,000 to resurface and reenforce the pool. The skimmer was also cracked but we elected a temporary fix. It is now worse because of improper installation and are paying roughly $2000 to dig it out. We discovered the pool plumbing was backwards and paid about $2000 to fix it. He charged us for an ultra violet apparatus which we didn’t need and it was never connected due to recall. He never corrected that issue and we paid another pool company to get the correct equipment and install it. Things that were “promised” never occurred. He tried to run roughshod over me since I am just a woman who doesn’t know anything and was determined he knew “best” regarding decorater issues. We had an interior designer. Everything cost significantly more than quoted. We spent approximately $400K (nearly double) and have spent considerably more in the ensuing years and are still spending. The double steel doors still do not open and the door guy won’t come out as he was not paid. No one else will touch the doors. We will have to hire someone else to completely replace ($6000) the doors which will then not match the other doors. We have water coming into the house in an area he was supposed to correct; a room that was completely rebuilt! I could go on and on and on. DO NOT USE DAVID BISHOP. It appears the address he uses is a repossessed home which is currently owned by the bank. STAY AWAY FROM DAVID BISHOP.

We are currently in the process of remodeling our master bath with the help of Mr Bishop. We hired him as a referral from a friend and did not feel the need to verify his past history. Now that we know more about him, we need to share this with others. I can support the prior statements here about blaming his subs, not finishing the job and just not communicating. We have paid him for about 85% of the job and still don't have running water or a finished floor in the bathroom. He has collected money from us for specific pieces of the project yet continues to tell his subs that we are not paying him. Really surprised to see this coming from a man who has been in the business for so many years.

We expect to contact the licensing authority next to see if we can gain some leverage on him. Otherwise, he may be getting a letter from our attorney next.
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Update in March -- We were able to get 3-4 more days of work from his subs over the last month which pushed us past the work we had already paid for. We are in the process of making a final payment to him & close his work on the project. We are using the last 10% of the funds to complete the work on our own. We are already working with a few subs to get the remainder of the work done on our own. Working well at this point.

It seems that Dave was not paying his subs for their work so they did not want to work for him any longer. Thus the delay in getting the work done -- and explains why we didn't see the same people twice. They gladly work for us when they know they will be paid when we sign off on the work.

We've had several friends who experienced this same problem in other cities in Texas. These independent contractors are not licensed or monitored by any Texas government agency, so you are dealing with them without leverage. Find a good one that has good, recent references. Pay them when the deliverable is completed and you sign off.