Taylor Homes

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• By a user in Vista

  June 10, 2017

  Front yard makeover

  1.0 star rating6/8/2017
  First to Review
  During October of 2016, I decided to start a front yard renovation. I wanted to replace the existing fence with a cedar craftsman style fence. A pedestrian gate, a vehicle gate and arbors were to be included with the fence. A 10X12 pergola with a stone floor. Remove all existing turf, plants and trees. New plantings with irrigation. Electricity to pergola and beyond for water fountain.
  I met with 3 contractors recommended to me by JW Lumber. After going over my budget- not to exceed $30,000- and the plans that I had drawn up, Michael Taylor of Taylor Homes was the only one who assured me that he could do it all under budget.
  A preliminary agreement was written up by Mr.Taylor and brought to me on October 28, 2016. We walked the property again and talked in detail about my expectations. I gave Mr.Taylor copies of plans I had drawn as well as pages from magazines with the look I was wanting. I decided that we would work off my design since the design that his architecture submitted looked carelessly slapped together and was nothing like what we had discussed.
  Mr. Taylor returned with a contract in hand and he walked me through the process that he had planned. He would first come and clear the area of all plants, and remove the fence. He would then be bringing in a Bobcat to grade the area before he started building. He said it would be a 2-3 week process and he would start the first week of January-after his workers were back from holiday. I signed the contract.
  Mid-December a crew came out to remove existing fence and plants.
  Mid-February Mr.Taylor showed up to start. He had an idea to create a arbor over the front door to tie the look together. A wide inviting entryway is what I needed. I came home to a 4ft. column that narrows the entryway. The cement footings are 3" higher than the foundation of the house. No type of walkway would work there. When I tried to talk to him about it he became belligerent . When we compared it to the plan he was to use he snarled "Then you've got yourself a problem". I asked him to leave it alone and start the deck. The deck footings were set in the wrong place. To keep one of the posts from standing directly in line with the front door he had to make it a 16X10 rather than a 12X10 on the original plan. When I noticed that the deck was much higher than the house foundation I asked about the Bobcat and grading. He said that he felt as though the two guys he sent over did a good enough job with their shovels.
  The fence posts were oddly spaced to avoid hitting the cement from the previous fence. He got frustrated when he realized it wouldn't work. He asked me what to do. I told him I would remove the posts and do it again. Why ask me? I'm not the builder. He started attaching fence posts to the house. I said no. He growled "Why Not?"
  It was the beginning of April, 2017. I asked him to meet me in the morning so that we could see if there was a way to fix all of it. I drew up a plan showing what he had done and what we now had to work with. Since he refused to redo any mistakes he made I was trying hard to work with what was there. He left and later emailed me that he would be back to start again and he would be bringing some receipts that he needed to be reimbursed for. He gave me the receipts and said he needed to be paid right then. I went inside to write the check. Looking through the receipts I noticed invoices dated summer of 2016-before we met. I noticed items that were not used on my job-lumber/gate. And he included receipts that I had paid JW Lumber directly. When I went out to ask him about it he came over to me, ripped them from my hand and said "I'm outta here". He packed up his tools and left.
  While I didn't pay him for the receipts he gave me that day I did go back and look at the receipts that he had given me earlier and paid. I had paid for items purchased before we met as well as items never delivered to my job.
  I was left with a mess. No fence. A dirt yard. Cement to be jackhammered out. I have found out that the lumber used was infested with termites

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