DoWALT Custom Homes

Where do I begin. We hired DoWalt to build our forever home. Up until the move in date DoWalt was doing everything possible to make our experience a good one. After we moved in and they got their money things changed.

Before we even got our plans signed we noticed that DoWalt was very disorganized. They would send us quotes and drawings for someone else's house. We couldn't meet with the owner so we met up with his subordinate and we were assured we were in good hands. A short time after he was let go along with everything that we spoke to him about.

We weren't even in the house for 24 hours before we had water in our basement coming up from the floor drain. It turned out the water softener was draining water that couldn't make it to our holding tank because it was completely full. It was a Saturday so we needed an emergency pump out which is around $460 dollars. We informed the owner of the company and he refused to pay for the pump out. He then suggested that we take the sump pump out of our pit and use it to pump the water out of our tank which is illegal. He then informed us that we should have a spare pump in case of emergencies. I guess I was supposed to expect an emergency on the first day of living in my brand new home. It wasn't until we said we were going to our lawyer that he finally agreed to pay for the emergency pump out.

DoWalt knows a lot about what the Manitoba Home Warranty does not cover. They informed us that it does not cover dry wall issues. We noticed that some spots were not sanded, some spots had gouges and some spots just didn't get more than one coat of paint. When we brought this up they immediately told us that it was not their problem. Then they informed us that they were no longer going to entertain our complaints. After receiving an email from our lawyer they sent someone to come and fix the issues. The only thing is that the gouges are still there, they just got another coat of paint on them. When we informed DoWalt they said the painter regrets that we are not happy with his work. That was it. We didn't get any other offer to come and fix the issue. The gouges are still there.

On our first walk through we noticed a major dip in the laminate flooring in our living room. The employee from DoWalt ensured us that it was humidity. When we brought it up to the owner at the final walk through he said "the floor only moves when you step on it". We explained that we could see the dip from across the room and we were ignored. The owner held on to the Manitoba Home Warranty paper the entire time and refused to write down any of our issues. After speaking with our lawyer once again they sent over someone from the flooring company to address the issue. They came up with a possible solution at which point DoWalt told us that the flooring guy said it was not covered under warranty and that we have to pay for it. It turned out that the flooring guy did not reject the claim, he just came to assess the situation. DoWalt just decided that we should pay for it.

At some point we had a water leakage in our basement that was no fault of DoWalt however it was interesting to note that the water on the floor traveled away from the floor drain. After taking a level and checking it out we discovered that the floor drain was higher than the surrounding floor rendering it completely useless. When we brought this to DoWalt's attention they informed us that the floor drain is supposed to be built such that the water pools around it so we can push it into the floor drain which was completely nonsense. Not only was this not the way a floor drain is supposed to be built, the water moved away from the drain it did not pool around it so they missed the mark if that's what they were going for. When they emailed the concrete company to come fix the issue they stated in their email that the way the floor drain is "meets their standard of quality" even though it did not even work as it was supposed to. To fix the issue they said they were going to send someone over with a wet grinder to minimize dust. They ended up coming with a dry grinder and got dust all over our basement. When we asked the guy who came to fix it if he worked at the concrete company who poured our floor he said no. He was just someone that DoWalt knows.

One corner of our gutters is leaking water. We informed DoWalt and they sent people out to come and fix it. Keep in mind it was the middle of winter. They informed us that the gutter company had come out and the issue was resolved. When we asked when they came to fix it we discovered that it was on a day in which we were at home. We didn't see anyone come by and there was no tracks in the snow. We asked how they were able to test if the gutter was actually fixed and they told us "we have never had to send them out twice" without doing any due diligence. In the spring when it started to rain again we noticed that the gutter was still leaking.

Our water softening unit was broken from the start as it kept on draining water due to a broken seal. We had to pump out our 2000 gallon tank 3 times in one month due to this issue. DoWalt refused to reimburse us for the pump outs. We had to fight for 3 months before they offered to go to McMunn and Yates to reimburse us for the pump outs.

A couple other smaller issues include not cleaning the house before we moved in as there are hand prints on some spots of the drywall. They ran electrical conduit to our holding tank to run wires for either an alarm or pump, whatever the case may be, but they didn't run the conduit into the house so we have to drill through the stucco, insulation and vapor barrier ourselves now. Why they did this is unknown as the only electrical box is inside the house.

We had requested to speak with the owner of the company several times and we always get contacted by somebody else in the company. They fought us every step of the way and took no responsibility for anything until we threatened them with lawyers. We highly recommend staying away from DoWalt if you choose to build a custom home. Other companies will give you a year to find any issues in your house and they will address it promptly. DoWalt gave us a half hour walk through and would referred to it every time we brought up an issue saying "Well you didn't say anything during our walk through". If quality and good customer service is what you are looking for, choose a different company and stay far away from DoWalt.