Silver Leaf Construction & Renovation

We were in the process of building a new construction home and after interviewing several contractors we met with Jeff, and decided to sign a Design Build Agreement for which he charged us $18,000. It was less expensive than the architects we had met with and we were advised that it was a good idea to get your blueprints in conjunction with your contractor because they know the cost of labor and material and are better suited to help keep you within your budget. After we came up with a suitable floor plan and he gave us the proposal for the build, it came in WAY OVER our budget we told him we wanted to keep. So obviously, we bid the project out to two other contractors. His proposal was not too far off from the others but a bit higher than one other contractor. Jeff told us that once we received all proposals, he'd be happy to match any pricing. We did go to him with the other proposal and when he came back with his price match, I felt insulted. He did not change the pricing on his labor, but rather just gave us lower allowances, which ultimately meant we'd have to pay more later for the quality of material we were looking for. Because we only signed a Design build agreement, we were always told that if we decided not to go with Silver Leaf for the construction portion, the blueprints were ours and would be finished and adjusted for permits as necessary. After we told Jeff that we were moving forward with another contractor, he was unresponsive. I asked to deal directly with the architect (whom I had never met but only dealt with through Jeff). The architect was unresponsive and after several calls to make minor changes and to prepare for permits, he said he was "too busy" to make any changes. He offered a Design Build release form for another architect, but ultimately did not finish the project. We went to another architect, which our new contractor recommended, and he had to make a complete set of new drawings for only $3,500. I much prefer our new layout as we were able to make changes we originally asked Jeff to make, but told us we could not without adding more to the budget...not true. Jeff appeared to be very professional and thus was the main reason in choosing him, but at the end he proved otherwise. Don't waste your time, if the design process went like this, so glad we didn't go through the whole construction process with him as well.