AT SIX ARCHITECTURE

At-Six was recommended to us by a friend in the industry when we were looking to do an extensive renovation on an older home in Alameda. Jason’s pitch was that they are bit more expensive than other contractors, but they handle projects down to the last detail. Sounded good to us. He let us know he was pretty booked up but would be able to start design in January with construction slated for early summer. In January, Jason introduced us to Michael, who he said was our project manager. As Michael started communicating with us, it became clear that Michael would actually be the architect on the project. This had not been clear to us from any previous conversation, but Michael seemed competent, so we started working with him on conceptual drawings over the next few months. Some unexpected issues came up during this time, including a foundation problem, but we worked through them and understood that we were still moving along on the project. Around June we were expecting to hear some noise about starting construction and realized the team had been pretty quiet. When we reached out, Jason told us that they had started another build that week and would not be able to start ours until September. We thought they had been working on permits, but they had not made any progress on this. We were, honestly, shocked. Not at the delay—delays are inevitable—but that nobody had thought to mention this to us. Jason and Michael apologized, and at any rate we were about to leave for the summer, so the only thing we could realistically do was leave the project in their hands and hope that we were now on the same page. Fast forward to mid-August when we got an email saying they were ready to submit for planning permission. Doing the math (6 weeks for a planning permit and then 6 weeks for a building permit) I pointed out that this didn’t seem to bode well for a September start date. Jason then told us that they had had a busy summer, had not submitted for permits on time, and could now start building in November. We had been in touch all summer and, again, nobody had mentioned to us that they were running behind. Around this time we started to look more closely at costs, as we were still getting bills in the thousands each month, despite what seemed like little progress. I went back and checked the initial proposal Jason had given us, which estimated fees for design at $8,000. By now he had billed us about $28,000. I asked him about the discrepancy, and he answered that they had done work beyond the proposal, but that the design was now complete and we wouldn’t see any more invoices until the construction phase. A couple weeks later we got another bill for $6,000. By this point we were fed up, and there was frankly no way we were going to proceed to the construction phase with a firm that appeared to be delivering everything behind schedule, over budget, and with zero proactive communication. We started interviewing other pros to take over the project. Then, the clincher. We talked to two contractors, three architects, and the head of an upscale design/build firm, and every single one was shocked at how much we had paid for the drawings we had. All 3 architects estimated they would have charged about $18-20k for the same work (by now we had been billed $34k). The head of the design/build firm suggested we take legal action. Also a surprise to us was the fact that the drawings we had were nowhere near what was needed to start construction. One contractor said he couldn’t even provide a firm bid based on them, as we lacked electrical, mechanical, and structural plans. I realize this is a very negative review. My intention is not to slam Jason or Michael, and it does seem they have delivered quality work for other people. Unfortunately, we had a level of trust when we started with them, which was misplaced. If you are considering working with them, you should be prepared to carefully watch spending, question every invoice, and check up on them frequently to make sure they are making the progress they have promised. Ideally you would also have someone else in the industry (like a contractor friend) to check in with if anything starts to seem fishy. We realize now that some of the stuff Jason told us was pretty far off base. In the end, it was kind of a blessing that they screwed up the design process badly enough that we had to let them go. We could absorb the unexpected costs for the design, but if they had handled the much costlier construction phase with the same level of (cough) care and attention, we would have been absolutely screwed. If you are educated about the process and able to watch it closely, I think you could potentially get good work out of these guys, although I’m not sure why you’d pay a premium for their services only to have to micromanage them. Unfortunately, for us, working with At-Six was a monumental waste of both time and money.

Well it is going so. We are about a month and good. It is a month into the building but 3 months into the design and architecture. As far as I can tell I noticed it’s very good, very nice, very detailed, very precise, on time and in budget so far. Yes, it was more than SOD price but the work changed significantly throughout the process and the work is still changing. Yes, very happy.