Topp Remodeling & Construction

Topp Construction (Brandon) is one of the most dishonest companies I have ever had the misfortune to work with. We paid them $1500 just to find out if our project was feasible or not.
We decided not to go w/them since they gave us an estimate that was almost $100,000 more than what we told them we could pay.
Months later we received a bill for $6700. As far as we can tell they did absolutely nothing (other than provide an estimate & give us some plans that they drew up that were duplicates of plans that we sent to them).
They took us to court & the judge ruled for them. We then discovered that one of Topp Constructions attorneys was a substitute judge for the same court where our hearing was held. In fact the judge hearing our case told some other people in the courtroom what a great substitute judge he was. I got the feeling that our case was decided before it was even started. Can you say coincidence? .....I think not.
The contract plainly stated that IF we agreed to go forward (which we did not) that they would bill us bi-weekly. After the initial $100 we did not receive ANY bill from them until months later for $6700. Apparently the judge didn't seem to think that was a problem & did not hold Topp Construction accountable to that part of the contract.
We are not wealthy people & because of the dishonesty of Topp Construction (Brandon & John) we are now out almost $9000 w/absolutely nothing to show for it.
Hopefully others can hear of our experience & not go through the stress that we had to. We did NOT hire them, all we were asking for was whether the job was feasible or not.
I hope this review will prevent this from happening to anyone else.

As of writing this review I’ve been working with Topp Construction for just over 6 months now, planning, prepping, and building a detached garage with an apartment above it. Having renovated 3 houses and worked with many contractors I’d grown to be pretty distrustful of the whole building industry in general. Topp Construction has restored my trust in building contractors again with how well they handled the project I contracted them to complete. They’ve been a pleasure to work with, their workmanship is excellent, and I’ve never presented them a problem they haven’t immediately corrected without pushing back.

I highly recommend Topp Construction, and I’ve sent their contact information to as many friends and colleagues as I could. My project has turned out better than I expected, and I’m more than happy I took this project on with Branden (CEO), John (VP), and the rest of the Topp crew. If you need a quality builder to help you remodel or build in the Salt Lake valley Topp is a great choice.

Topp gets high marks on 5 key considerations that I’m going to break out in more detail below: Quality, Reliability, Communication, Flexibility, and Value.

Quality
The quality of their work is excellent. I’ve been very happy with how things are turning out, and I haven’t had an issue of needing to call out the quality of the finished product. My garage feels amazing every time I step inside it, and the apartment we built above it feels head and shoulders above every other rental in the area. Part of this boils down to the materials I chose, but even the best materials poorly installed would have looked bad.
Every person I’ve had in the garage and the apt has been impressed with the quality and workmanship on display, and I’ve heard, more than a couple times, “whatever you’re paying these guys, it’s worth it.”
A big part of builder quality meeting homeowner expectations is to have clear expectations to begin with. I’m confident Topp can give you the level of quality you want; you just need to be clear on what you expect and what you’re willing to pay, and Topp will make that happen.

Reliability
Over the years I’ve become accustomed to contractor time, which roughly works out to me multiplying whatever amount of time they tell me by 7 days. I’m happy to report here that isn’t the case with Topp. While we haven’t made our deadline, the miss is largely due to change orders on my end (such as installing a new, 50’ x 25’ driveway) and some holdups with work I’d been performing. Some of the delays appear to have come from Topp’s subcontractors, but overall on a 6 month project I’d say the delays caused by top are less than 2 weeks, which in my book is pretty well right on time.
I’ve also been pleasantly surprised by how little effort has been needed on my end to ensure commitments were kept. If Topp agreed to something it got done and didn’t really require any prodding on my end to ensure it happened.They said they’d do it and then they went and did it. For anyone with a normal adult life of work and family obligations that reliability and dependability is huge.

Communication
Communication has been generally very good with Topp. I’ve never gone more than a couple days without hearing back from Topp when I have reached out to them about something or other, and their responses have been clear and provided timelines along with good expectation setting.

We haven’t had any arguments either about anything really. Everything has been professional and honest, and I’ve been consistently pleased working with these guys because I have trust they’ll respond to me.

Flexibility
Really high marks here for the guys at Topp. I’ve made a number of change requests, large ones, and Topp has managed to include them without pushing the timelines too far out. I’ve also not heard any complaining about changes and updates to the plan. I modeled my entire project out in CAD, rendered everything so I could see it ahead of time, and had a detailed financial plan covering how I wanted to proceed, and I still found things that I wanted changed and added during the project. Just the nature of large projects, and I put a lot of value on having a flexible partner who can help accomplish those changes.

Value
Topp was good about pushing me towards better materials while weighing my budget considerations. Unless you’re at a point where money isn’t a consideration in your life you’ll always be trying to maximize the quality of every dollar you spend, and Branden and John were both helpful in spelling out the tradeoffs of different materials and approaches and to call out where more money didn’t necessarily result in a better finished product.

I did pay what I consider a lot of money for a total of about 1,300 sq. ft. half of which is finished garage space. However, I think that is more a function of the demand for builders in Utah than anything else, and given the smoothness of the project, and Topp’s ability to meet my ch

I recently completed a kitchen and upstairs remodel project with Topp Construction, Branden O’Very. I want to share my experience so that others can potentially avoid a terrible experience. The quality of their workmanship is horrendous, their subcontractors are terrible, and the owner of the company is a man without integrity.

They gave me an estimate for the work based on detailed kitchen cabinet plans and a list of items I wanted included as part of the remodel. They work on a cost-plus basis. I did not feel comfortable proceeding with the job under those terms as I wanted to know what the project was going to cost before I started. They assured me that the estimate was accurate unless we encountered something unexpected. I asked them repeatedly if the bid numbers were accurate and representative for the items planned and they assured me they were. Overall, their company did much less work than was bid in the estimate and the final bill was more than the original estimate.

The electrical was more involved than anticipated in the original estimate. That would have been easily determined when they bid the job if they had taken the time to look at the electrical panel or have an electrician come out. They did neither. The electrical bill was more than 6 times the original estimate (estimate $1450, bill over $9,000). They did the additional work (additional panel, redoing circuits) without ever discussing the increased costs or completing any change order as is specified in the contract. As is detailed by other reviews, they mischarge for items without any accountability for the charges. I found countless mistakes in their invoices and there is no way to tell from their accounting if what they are charging is correct.

In addition, the subcontractors and quality of the workmanship is horrible. They framed walls that weren’t plumb (off by ½ inch between the floor and the ceiling), shelves weren’t level, and walls that were the incorrect length. They had to rebuild the pantry 3 times because the walls weren’t plumb, the shelves weren’t level, and they installed the door too low for the hardwood floors to fit under it. Every day I had to catch things that were done incorrectly. The sheet rocker left ripples and bubbles in the walls. It is so bad that another contractor I had come and look at it to see what it would take to fix it asked me if it was supposed to be a textured wall. The paint on my doors and casings is peeling off because the painter painted latex over oil based paint without priming it. I have to have a different painter come in and redo the paint. The painter painted so much dirt into the walls such that I don’t think I will ever be able to get my walls back to the way they looked previously. There are nails sticking out of most of the baseboards. I have spent hours scraping paint off of hinges, door knobs, and glass. They hit a water line in the floor and flooded the basement. They ruined the carpet, furniture, a framed picture and personal items. They grudgingly replaced the carpet but refused to pay for anything else that was damaged. They damaged the bathroom cabinet when they tore out the tile because they didn't cover the cabinet or protect it in any way and they refuse to do anything to fix it.

Brandon claims he wants to make things right, but nothing could be further from the truth. All he does is make empty promises and sling insults. Now that it is time to fix all the problems as warranty issues, he has stopped answering his phone and doesn’t return any calls. He won’t respond to emails. He is a man without integrity. I have done a remodel previously and built a large custom home. Both of those projects were completed relatively smoothly and without any of the issues I have had with this remodel. This company is horrible and I wish I had never heard of Topp Construction. Someone would have to be crazy to use this company for a construction project.