Dan's Carpentry Inc.

Dan is a very nice guy and was referred by some friends of ours who worked with him 2 years ago. The Dan of 2013 vs. the Dan of now is a totally different business. Our friends had mostly Dan doing the work. They indicated that it was a slow process but the work was top notch. The Dan of then vs. the Dan of now is a different Dan's Carpentry! He now subcontracts out to many laborors who are not always the best quality, nor does he follow up. I think we saw Dan at our house maybe five times and the last time was to get his final check and finish the punch list I made. It took three months for the completion of this job. It was such a painstaking process, we actually mutually agreed to not pay him for the last of the job (window replacement-he did not do because of snow), due to his unprofessionalism, which he was good with because he obviously wanted to move onto other jobs. The original quote was for completion within four to six weeks. Our sinks and vanities and toilets were in our basement for two weeks waiting for action so we did not hold up the job. As a subcontractor, Dan is woefully under skilled or over worked. He sets up appointments for his subcontractors who may or may not show up. Then when they show up, he does not come to review their work. This required me to be home many times because these were not always people who he worked with extensively so we had a lack of trust with our household. Most times, the subcontractor was here for maybe 2-4 hours total. Additionally, I had to write "punch list" emails and texts to get things fixed to my meager satisfaction. From the demo of the two bathrooms in January, through the snow avalanche we had in Boston, the excuse for only 1x/week visits by subcontractors was that Dan was busy plowing. The subcontractors don't plow so this was an annoying excuse. So we prod him to get this job done so we can get our bathrooms back and finally on March 24th, they are complete. However, Dan knew from the start that there would be a two week period where I was unavailable to participate in getting this job done. At this time, because he was not "on top of the job" in January and Feb, he threatened us via an email using his contractual language and demanding his final money despite not being finished at that time. When the job was done, we are satisfied with the job and it looks good. Average. Now we are in May, there are plumbing issues which took Dan two weeks to respond to despite leakage onto the floor. His excuse was that he no longer works with that plumber. The plumber finally showed up today when we texted each other to coordinate. Again, no Dan follow up. There are issues with a small tile side job we paid his tile guy for. He sais we have to work with the tile guy directly because he does not work with that guy anymore. He has yet to get me his number and followup. During the 10 weeks, I understood slight delays during the process because Dan was also busy building a house for he and his wife. It annoyed me greatly though, that I would see on Instagram pictures of work he had completed at his house at the same time interval when we were being given constant excuses. To others I would say: It is not worth your time to work with this nice guy untll he stops making commitments he cannot keep. Or if you decide to, make penalties a must in your contract for delays and subpar quality.