TAKE PRIDE

It took two months to get started after we received bid for work. This was due to lack of responsiveness to emails and phone calls and final response required the threat of turning to another provider which we would have done except that we were against a deadline for the city program requirement which the Take Pride knew about at the time they bid the job which was four months prior to starting. They were a month late finishing the job which was beyond contractual agreement due to taking a two week vacation that was not communicated by the overseer but by his labor lead the day he left on vacation. Work was not done to specification with some work needing to be redone. Power control boxes were installed in the wrong location resulting in holes in exterior wall and stucco/paint patching that was not covered by the contractor. The wrong plants were installed at a higher cost (a fruiting olive tree vs. a non-fruiting tree; incorrect colors of plants); roughly 30% of contractor-provided plants died within three months. Many of these came from the contractors and quot;nurseryand quot; which we were told would save us money however we were charged full price as if they had dome from a newly planted nursery. We picked out landscaping boulders that the contractor was to purchase and deliver however, the boulder company called us repeatedly when they were unable to get pick-up times and payment from the contractor. When they were delivered, the contractor did not send enough men so that my father had to help with our own equipment. Because I had spoken to the boulder provider directly, I knew the cost of the boulders however when the final bill came, the cost was 37% higher than it should have been. All else had been paid on time and throughout the process as dictated by the contract however when I questioned the boulder costs on the final bill, I was provided with a breakdown that included the contractor's overhead and labor, which I expected, however they multiplied this by another and quot;overhead percentageand quot; that made the cost come to the amount provided but in reality charged us double for the contractor's involvement. Because I questioned this by email and had not received a response, I had not paid it. Although I was within the 30 days of payment agreement, one of the owners sat outside my property in his vehicle waiting for me to return home upon which time, he stormed at me from across the street enraged and accusing me of dodging him. This was the first time I had met this owner having previously only dealt with his partner. He then threatened to place a lien on my house while accusing me of ignoring his phone calls to avoid paying. At this point, he had placed one to my husband while he was at work that very morning. This was the first time I had met this owner having dealt with his partner on all previous transactions and he proceeded to yell at me and verbally abuse me to the point that I felt physically threatened. This occurred in the middle of the morning while my husband was at work as were the neighbors. When I offered to settle the bill that day if he could explain the billing to me, he screamed at me and got in his car telling me he was going to his lawyer to have a lien placed on my house. He refused to discuss his billing or answer questions merely insisting that we pay him the amount. Mind you, this was less than $400 in discrepancy on a $13,000 bill the rest of which had already been paid. Ultimately, we decided to pay him in order to get a release of the mechanics lien so that he couldn't continue to irrationally threaten our home security and because his behavior was so erratic, that we didn't want to chance another encounter. As a corporate operations professional with 20 years experience in purchasing, negotiations and management for Fortune 500 companies, I had never experienced anything so unprofessional nor had I ever felt so physically threatened in a business dealing. The crew Take Pride used was friendly and helpful. They showed up on time and were dressed in company t-shirts and were respectful of me and my inquiries into their work. The management was a different story. They were delinquent, unprofessional, non-communicative and threatening. I had to constantly stay on them with emails and phone calls to the office manager and still the project was delayed, overdue, over budget and one of the most miserable experiences I have had in home services. We have enjoyed our yard however, it has not been without problems from the fruiting olive tree (we paid 40% more to have a non-fruiting one) to the weeds that continue to come up in our yard from the three week delay where our grass had been removed but the new sod left bare for grass seeds to take root, I get angry anytime I think about Take Pride and their involvement in our yard. This was definitely a case of paying for shoddy work to get signed release so that an erratic and hysterical owner could not seek further destruction of our sanity. I see them working on other yards in town and some corporate contract jobs and I get angry each time I see their trucks as it brings up such a bad association. They even used our yard as an example of their work as we have had people stop by to inquire about the yard and reference Take Pride as directing them to our yard. In summary, I would never recommend Take Pride, and owners John and Milton, to anyone. It was one of the worst business experiences of my life.

I have been happy with their work. Price wise they are very reasonable for the amount of work they do.

After a few hiccups at the beginning the lawn and irrigation installation went well. The person who came over to give the estimate (Milton if I remember correctly), was very knowledgeable and gave us advice on the care of some of our plants we have in our yard in addition to the estimate for replacing our lawn. After I emailed them the signed contract, I did not hear back for a week and finally had to email them again to see what was going on. Apparently they were busy finishing up a couple of other jobs. There was also a bit of confusion on the actual start date as they came over a day or two before I expected them to spray the existing lawn with an herbicide to kill it and if fact I didn't know they came over until I called their office to clarify the start date. Once we got past that bit of confusion, the rest of the job proceeded smoothly. They removed the dead lawn and amended the soil. They did a great job of installing the new automatic sprinkler system and were careful to cap off our existing irrigation system so that we were still able to water the other parts of our yard. The sod installation also went smoothly and Milton gave a very detailed set of instructions for watering and maintaining the lawn over the next 12 months. It has been about a year since it was installed and is looking great.