Greenwolf

Walter offered to pickup the cabinets and started assembly prior to our demolition day to save us the delivery charge. He initially estimate 2 days of work prior to the demolition to assemble the cabinets and 2 days of work (Friday and Saturday) to finish the demolition and cabinet installation. On the pickup day, he showed up at Ikea with a fully loaded SUV with a roof rack while I have 11 kitchen cabinets. He end up taking about 1/3 of them when his SUV is full, and luckily I have a hatchback that can load the remaining 2/3. We went home and he started assembling some of the cabinets. Before he leave he ask for $500 deposit out of around $1900 of work The next Saturday he arrived in the mid afternoon to assemble the rest of the cabinets but was not able to finish them. We decided to prioritize on the base cabinets first so the counter top company can do the template and we can continue. Walter didn't show up on the original demolition day (Good Friday), because he had something to do with his mom, so one day of our tight schedule is gone. He showed up in the early afternoon on Saturday for the demolition, but didn't bring floor protection as he promised. I end up covering the hard wood floor as much as I can with Ikea cabinet cardboard and sweeping and vacuum as much as I can to protect the floor. Still, we end up with 3-4 major scratches. He also didn't remove all of the appliance before demolition, until I insist, he then tape up the dish washer to protect the top. This is the day that we should have finished everything. He ask for another $500 because he has a loan due that day, I gave it to him telling him that this will be his last pay before he finish. He showed up on Sunday at around 3-4pm because he couldn't finish his other higher priority job in Redwood City. He finished most (but not all) of the demolition and he started patching the drywall. He incorrectly measured the thickness and we end up with 5/8" instead of 1/2", trying to just mud it up and insist it is 5/8" until I picked up the old drywall with barcode and check online to prove it wrong. This is the safety margin day I saved just in case things go wrong. Monday he was not responding on when he will show up until around 5pm, and arrive at 6pm. I almost scheduled the template this morning, but I scheduled it to Tuesday instead. We continue the rest of the demolition (some back splash), then tape and mud the drywall seam and did some plumbing work that he insist is needed (making the drain outlet from wall straight out instead of 45 deg, which later was found to be code violation and I have to restore it back myself). We also try to fix a leaking valve. At the end of the day Walter's SUV is so full he refuse to takeaway the debris because his SUV is full, and he need $500 again to pay for his car loan. I only paid him $200 because he is really behind and I can't pay him too much. For the next 3 days Walter showed up at 6-7pm and work till 10pm-1am, and everyday he told me to have faith in him that the work will finish "tomorrow". I was doing a lot of work on the side and caught him almost making a few major mistakes: cutting the wrong amount of hardwood floor, cutting the wrong hole location in the cabinets, almost burn the drywall when solder a cap on a pipe, trying to force a few incorrectly build cabinet in, use a tiny bubble level when the large one won't pass, etc. This wasted a lot of time and got Walter very upset on how picky I am and how it is unreasonable. I end up taking apart a few cabinets he build after he left so I can fix it without him complaining. On Thursday I found out that my original plan of raising the base cabinets by 1.5" is not going to work, so I offer to pay Walter more money to take it down to normal height as it was my fault. On Friday, I was told by my boss that I've made too much mistakes at work that I will have to find another job in about 2 months, or the upper management will initiate the process with HR. I was spending too much time "supervising" Walter and working with him after work, sometimes even after Walter left I was going back to work to catch up, that I was making a lot of mistakes. That night Walter suggested that we should at least finish building the island so we can template the counter top asap. I agreed that night, but later changed my mind because it was too risky (what if Walter couldn't and we dragged on for another week). On Saturday morning, I told Walter we'll terminal the project as it is. Walter refuse and wanted to continue forward. Walter shows up at 3pm that day, I told him he should just pick up the rest of the debris so I can pay him the amount of work he finished. He then told me picking up the debris is not part of the deal until I show him the email we have at the beginning. In the end he got very angry with curses, telling me that he declined a couple $500 jobs so he can help me and he needed $500 that day for a loan due. We come to an agreement eventually for $300 (because I told him on Friday we are doing the island Saturday) and he had to remove all debris. It took him 2 car loads instead of the 1 he said is necessary. On the 1st load he demand the $300, I refuse, offer to pay $150 because it is not done and I worried that he would not come back for the 2nd load. He got very angry, to a point that I almost worry about personal safety. My wife started yelling back but I told her to go back into the house and close the door. Walter came back 2 hours later, finally calmed down, for the 2nd load and I pay him the $300 as promised. I ended up with a half finished kitchen that a lot of contractors refused to touch. My dad and I spend 2 more days lowering the base cabinets down to the right height, redoing the drain back the original way, build and anchor the island base, and level and mount the wall cabinet rail. A week later, I was able to find a builder to finish the rest of the work in 5 days. Looking back I have the following opinion about Walter: He is not bad in terms of fixing plumbing related work, but he is not aware of all the codes. He was not very good with math, in both dimension measurement and work effort, so he way underestimated the amount of time and work needed. He was desperately in need of money, and he will do anything, take any job, start another section before finish, just to get enough deposit money and ask for more money because he started something. This eventually overwhelm him as he is perpetually overwhelmed and behind schedule, making it impossible to finish his work on time. He is burnt out and I can see it, as he make a lot of mistakes that most people will never make if you have a ruler in your hand and do these work on a daily basis. Overall, I think Walter is a nice person, with attempts to perform work with good ethics. He under deliver and is late, trying to cut corner when he is behind schedule to catch up. If I have a couple quick plumbing work I will be ok with hiring him again, but his delay and work quality end up costing me 2 weeks of delay (I catch up 1 week by paying $425 to the counter top company to expedite the order by 1 week), $140 of wasted plumbing work, $250 in drywall texture repair (he was way too careless with drywall and mud, to even the non backsplash area), 3 big scratches on the hard wood floor, and about $500 worth of cabinets work that he didn't do or done incorrectly. Most importantly, I lost my job partly because of spending too much time helping and supervising Walter, and too much energy dealing with the kitchen.

Initially Walter was hired based on a recommendation from Home Depot website. 2 References for Walter checked out okay. Had him start on projects described above. The previous owners had installed new windows but nothing else. The problem was that he started all the jobs at once, and never finished a single one. He started painting after he did wood work. He needed a lot more supervision than I could provide. He did do some projects okay, but I still had to redo most of his work. He no money to pay for materials up front. There for I had to give him Home Depot gift cards, worth $800, and he used it all within 2 days, which tipped it off to me that he was using the money for something else. When I started asking for receipts is when he disappeared and did not return my phone calls. Every time I saw him he was asking for money. Through text messaging, and other referrals, it came to light that Walter was in some financial issues. Shelving in garage was flimsy, and hung very poorly. Had to repaint the ceiling due to him using a glossy paint, re-shelve the garage, and had to have a new handyman correct the shelving in closets as well.