Where do I begin? This is a classic example of what not to do when a roofing contractor comes to your door in the winter. I am a first-time homeowner and did not do enough research about roofers and since I couldn’t find any bad reviews about this company, I gambled on the hope of getting a decent roof at a sweet price. What I got was sub-par quality and more than four months of grief and stress just to have all the work completed as we agreed upon – and it is still not done! I trusted my gut on this one and it might be the only time in my life where it failed me miserably. Below are all the things that went wrong with the job:
- Came to my door in February claiming he had to move a lot of product and could give me a price well-below the industry average;
- estimated the work from the ground;
- no contract up front, no insurance provided, contract was hand written three weeks later after much pressuring and was written on letterhead of his supposed shingle supplier;
- claims his work is "guaranteed" for 20 years;
- virtually no professionalism;
- boasted of doing dozens of houses in the area. He even drove me around the neighborhood and showed me the work;
- did a poor job overall (no ice damming on first row in many places, exposed nails were left, some not driven all the way in, some nails overdriven, installed drip edge on after shingles were placed, caps had to be redone because they were crooked, didn’t overhang leading edge far enough into many troughs causing the water to leak between troughs and fascia);
- asked for cash only as needed as job progressed at a glacial pace;
- roofers were caught drinking on the job and were conveniently throwing their empty cans and bottles into my attic (they were let go even though I had to clean out my attic);
- worksite was a complete mess (only rectified after repeatedly berating the owner to clean up the job site)
- extremely slow and poor work ethic (took almost 3 weeks to do a basic roof -weather was a very limiting factor considering this February in Calgary was one of the warmest in recent memory)
- complete inability to meet any deadline provided (crews would show up at whatever time they felt like it – usually after frost melted but sometimes later in the day)
- terrible project management skills – did not procure enough materials in advance, did not rent a bin, left garage on yard for days, shingles were hand-delivered up the ladder, etc.)
- does not return calls;
- Since the shingling was done at the end of February, I gave him six weeks to come back and figure out a way to get the water to drain into troughs, he has committed six times to dates to finish the outstanding work and each time he hasn’t shown up, or call to say he won't be there and then offers little to no explanation as to why he won’t get it done.
Do not use this company by any means no matter how sweet of a deal he offers you. It is embarrassing to even write about this but I do not want anyone else to have potentially go through anything like my wife and I have. Spend the extra few thousand of dollars to get the job done right and avoid the headache.
- Approximate cost of services:
- $6,000.00