Rodas Builders

Erick Rodas sees a contract not so much as an agreement to build, as a game to see how much he can extract from the owner. Erick has a clear passion for that game, and puts a lot of effort into working out ways in which he can get more out of his opponent. He will stop work, misread the blueprints, and tell you whatever is necessary; on occasion he will also send his crew to do exactly as much work as is necessary to keep the game going. If he had as much passion for building and repairing houses as he has for playing the contract game, he would be a fabulous contractor.

The big point of contention was getting Erick to show up. Counting only non-holiday weekdays until I fired him, Erick's crew and subs worked 27 days and didn't work 45 days. That meant that in three months, they got through three weeks of the schedule as in the contract. There were penalties for lateness in the contract, but it seems he did the math and worked out that it's more profitable to have several jobs running slowly than to have fewer jobs running quickly. At every hiatus, he had an explanation for why they'd stopped work---he was waiting for the architect to comment on some detail, or the bathtubs were still on order. But in a project of this magnitude, there are a dozen independent things that need doing. Some people have commented that Erick is unable to handle doing several things in parallel; others are of the opinion that these were just excuses so that he could stop work again. That is, the debate was whether Erick is dishonest or just incompetent.

He gave me several moving speeches about how this time he's turned over a new leaf: he was missing work because his wife left him but now she's back, or he's done with the other jobs that took up the time and now he's free to work mine, and so on. I ignored them, and the rate at which the crew showed up never changed after any of them.

How was the work when he did show up? Pretty cheap. One wall was demolished and to be rebuilt. It had been built on packed dirt in olden times, so it needed a concrete footer to be poured. Rather than pour the footer, Rodas's crew built the wall on top of the existing floor, inside of where the old wall had been. I eventually gave him $350 (roundoff error on this project), the architect gave him a stern talking-to, and he poured the footer. The wall is still crooked and mostly in the wrong place, but better than before. The subfloor he laid was distinctly not level.
I got a warning from the city that there was a gap between the wall of my house and the townhouse next door. The neighbors thought water was leaking through to their basement. It's certainly in lousy shape, with some rotten wood, and an interior joist visible from the outside and sporting that rained-on look. Because sealing the house from the elements was part of the contract, Erick checked it out (after several phone calls, after I explained to him that he would be liable for any fines the inspector imposes), and told me that it looked fine to him; there was nothing for him to do. I hired another contractor to fill it in.
Rodas Builders was the lowest bidder, and Erick assured me before the contract was signed that he was not a change-order kind of guy (I suppose because that's what I wanted to hear). But on day one of the contract, Erick told me that there were unforeseen circumstances and that he would have to add significant charges to the contract. Another part of the contract was to level a slanted floor, and when Erick got to it months later, he told me that it was completely impossible for the price and that I would have to pay him several thousand more. Conditions regarding the floor had not changed at all, so I can only conclude that he had never intended to do the work at the given price.

After three months of waiting and arguing, I hired another contractor (Arnulfo Garcia), who repaired the damage caused by Rodas for a few thousand dollars, and finished the contract for less than Rodas's original bid---and without constant complaints that he needed more money.

By the time I finally fired Rodas, I was getting unsolicited calls from a sub and another homeowner, complaining about how Erick likes to play with the numbers and the frustrations of getting him to do what he signed on to do. So it seems it's not just me.

There is no reason to hire Rodas Builders. They may be the lowest bidders, but Mr Rodas will do his best to drive up the total cost of the project after you are bound to him by a contract. There really are good contractors out there, and it's worth your time up front to find them rather than go with somebody who will take your money but in the end won't do the work.