Trinity Custom Homes

I have never encountered a business worse than this one. My advice to anyone considering Trinity is to run away, but run away fast. I contracted Trinity to build a modest home for us in Harlem. We chose Trinity because their price was much lower than other builders. After closing on the loan, we learned why. Before Trinity had even started on construction, they started hitting us with extra costs. More block - $1700, extra steps - $1800, building permits - thousands of dollars. When we protested that these things should have been included in the original estimate, Trinity refused to build the home after we filed a complaint against them with the Better Business Bureau and left several negative reviews online. Of course this was after we'd closed, so Trinity was already holding tens of thousands of dollars that belonged to us. We would have been happy to walk away at this point, but doing so would have meant a loss of well over $10k in closing costs and other fees. Ultimately, we had to hire an attorney to compel Trinity to finish the home. In the end, we closed on our loan in early June and the house wasn't finished until February. Even though our contract stated that Trinity was supposed to finish the home in 120 days after footers were poured, the footers were poured in August and the house wasn't done until February. The sales guy Ryan, told us on multiple occasions that it almost never took them a whole 4 months to finish a house. The house we got has a ton of shoddy construction that Trinity refused to fix during our walkthrough. The posts on the front porch have gashes in them, but Trinity said they met building code even if they're ugly. One window was shoe-horned into place and cracked the window frame, instead of replacing it Trinity smeared some caulk on the crack that of course just cracked again within a week or two. When Trinity's contractors built steps that didn't come all the way to the ground, they stole several hundred dollars of rock from a pile of rock that was supposed to be used for our driveway to fix the problem. Trinity failed our certificate of occupancy inspection with Columbia County over 9 issues. Their fixes paid zero attention to how they looked cosmetically. Including using white caulk in between a grey box and grey siding. Also, a lot of the posts to the porches weren't even level. Also, all of the finishes are super cheap and there's no way to upgrade. The light fixtures, stove, doors and locks are all things that will likely have to be replaced and discarded. During the process, Trinity asked lots of things of us that other builders never do (between my parents and I, this was our 4th custom home we'd had built) like pulling permits. We had to fill out permits, work with the county and pay for permits. Then Trinity expected us to know construction related items like what the County code was for how close they could dig the well to our property line. When I protested that it wasn't my responsibility to know building codes, they blew up on me. They would tell us at the last minute that a specific permit was needed, and then when it took days or a week to get, act like we were holding things up. Finally, nearly all of our issues arose from dealing with the owner of Trinity homes Jerry Bobek and his yes-man Jim Bartlebaugh. Jerry threatened me with everything from imprisonment to lawsuits for leaving bad reviews. He also told me again and again that Trinity secretly records all conversations with customers and that his Atlanta attorneys would leave me broke and penniless if I didn't do what he said. He told me several times that he had people "looking into me". The guy is completely unhinged and I wouldn't buy a paperclip from him. Also, don't be fooled by the name "Trinity", in my experience there is absolutely nothing Christian about this business, the people who run it or the man who owns it.

In 2012 I hired Trinity Custom Homes {Augusta Georgia Office} to build a new home. Cheryl was our sales representative and did a fantastic job in helping us through the initial buying process. I have seen where others have mentioned that Cheryl performed as well for them too. The problem is Cheryl does not represent my overall experience with Trinity. During the process of my build The site supervisor, Julio, placed the foundation too close to the adjoining property line resulting in a delay in construction, as well as additional cost. Because we were anxious about having to find another builder and all that came with that, we reached a resolution with Trinity and resumed the build. Despite this problem the home was completed on time. Approximately 3 months ago my wife and I noticed that in several rooms of our home that the ceiling treatment was falling away from numerous areas where either nails or screws had been used. Then we discovered that the baseboard trim had begun peeling away from the wall in one of our bathrooms. I checked my warranty from Trinity and confirmed my suspicion that these problems were not covered after the first year. My wife and I discussed it and thought that perhaps Trinity would be willing to offer some sort of assistance because of the short period of time {a little over 2 years} that we had had the home. I called the Augusta Georgia office on 8/15/14 and spoke with Chris. I explained that while I understood that the warranty had expired that I was a disabled veteran on a fixed income and had hired Trinity Custom Homes to build a quality home that wouldn't require more than normal wear and tear after for a reasonable period of time-unexpected repairs are h****** a pension. He was very affable and expressed his regret about our problems and asked me to send a warranty work order form to him and said that he was sure that something could be done to help me. I was impressed that he made the offer before I could ask. He stated that he would call me back. After two weeks of no return call from Chris I called him back. He apologized for the delay and said that Billy, his supervisor had instructed him to come out and assess the problem areas. We made an appointment for this and Chris didn't show up or call. He continued to do this four more times. It became clear that Chris had no intention of keeping his promise.On 9/22/14 I managed to speak with Billy by phone, explained to him my problem with Chris and the promise of some sort of resolution. Billy promised to look into it and get back to me right away.On 9/29/14 I called Trinity { Ellijay Georgia Office} again, not having received any reply from Billy and asked to speak with him. Instead I spoke with an individual who identified himself as the general manager. He asked if he could help and had me explain my problem. I did and he then explained that these problems were only covered in the first year after the build and were from settling and "had to be expected". I reminded him that Chris had offered to make some sort of resolution for me and that was why i had pursued the matter. The manager then became obviously hostile and irritated, lecturing me on home building and implying I was naive as a customer to expect not to have these problems this early in the life of the home. When I asked the manager if this was a business philosophy that he would be willing to share with potential buyers,perhaps on social media, he angrily accused me of threatening him and that was the end of our conversation. I have always tried to be fair with my reviews on this site. I will summarize by saying that my Rating here reflects my experience during and AFTER the build. In my opinion the way to judge a business is how they treat people when no one else is watching them.No, Trinity Custom Homes was not obligated by warranty to provide any assistance to me. One of their employees did however agree that it was something that didn't reflect well on the image of their company and offered to make some sort of resolution.To have such unpleasant and unprofessional interaction that followed with such a company makes me regret my business with them. I would have to say that you should consider builders other than Trinity Custom Homes.

So far we are well pleased with Trinity in Augusta, Ga. We look forward to the start of the construction on our home.

The lady there named Sheryl is very pleasant. She does try to explain things to you and tries to work within your budget. So I think she is good person to work with. I would recommend them to someone else but I don’t need to build another house since I am working on one now.

We were looking to build a home and had no idea we could afford to build and get almost everything we wanted too. I talked with Trinity Custom Homes because I saw an advertisement. After meeting with the representative, he immediately gave us references and we were able to talk with existing happy customers. The home was built quickly and with good quality. I was able to be onsite almost everyday and saw the workmanship. The representative did not use any pressure and we were able to change the floor plan to suit our taste. The service after the sale has been exceptional. Julio is the person of oversite and he is extremely easy to communicate and work with. I highly recommend Trinity Custom Homes.