Northtown Construction

On the 8 July 2015, I entered into two contracts with Northtown Construction. One contract was for the tear off and installation of a roof of on my home and garage and the installation of a bathroom vent. The second contract was to replumb the kitchen and install a new sink, garbage disposal, faucet, and countertop. The work on the roof commenced the week of 17 August 2015. After the roof work was completed, but before the bathroom vent was installed, Mr. Young contacted me and asked for an appointment to inspect the roof work and pay the balance of the first contract. I felt comfortable doing this because there was another contract and it made sense that all the work inside the house be done at the same time. At that time Mr. Young told me that it would be approximately four weeks before they could return to do the interior work. The balance of the work for the first contract (the bathroom vent installation) was eventually finished on 8 December 2015. By then, I was so frustrated with my treatment that I no longer wanted to continued doing business with them. They usually did not respond to my phone calls, they could not give me an approximate time when my work would begin, when they could give me a date the notice was short (I worked two job at the time. I needed to give at least a week notice for days off), and on one occasion they did not come when they were expected to (I lost a day of work as a result). At our final meeting on 16 December 2015, they agreed, in writing, to void the second contract and return my deposit to me. Till today they have not returned my deposit despite signing a memo agreeing they would with a date by when I could expect the check. On top of this, my roof is leaking around the chimney. I've called them numerous voicemails and messages with staff to schedule an appointment to have them look (with me present) at it since the roof is under warranty. I told them I have pictures of the problem. I've been ignored. So now, not only do they owe me money, but they will not honor their warranty.

The flashing around the base of the chimney is about an inch away from the chimney itself, filled in with caulk and not even flashed to the dormer at all. The chimney cap was supposed to be a crown, made from concrete, sloped to shed water, a drip edge and a caulked bond break around the flue liner. What they did was a poorly done wash, possibly made out of left over mortar, that is already cracked in 2 places, and all the way around the flue liner. The chimney itself seems fine, other than 1 place where the mortar was loose and fell out, and is leaking into the attic. The removal of insulation was supposed to be done using their mold abatement procedure. Instead, the insulation was pulled out of the attic area, and tossed about all over the stairs and upper landing of my house. The vermiculite insulation should’ve been removed using extreme care since it was never even tested for asbestos, like EPA recommends, instead of the dust pan used to scoop it up, and shop vac to suck it out. Batt insulation was not removed entirely from the slopped wall/ceiling area as told to me that it would be, so new blown in insulation wasn’t able to totally fill the half empty voids left behind. Now there is no insulation in the bottom half of my slanted wall/ceiling area. The soffit vent seems to be acceptable, and other than a few exposed nails, 1 popping out, 1 shingle covering the ridge vent that has torn through and left the nail hole, the ridge vent might be ok too. Their employees used a ladder on top of our AC unit, tearing holes in the cover. The gutters atop my 2 flat roofs are fine, the 2 spanning the whole distance of the house do not slope properly, and retain over an inch of water. Down spouts are fine. Other than not being flashed properly, the new vinyl siding is fine with no problems so far. The tear off of the old roof was done very well considering there were too many layers there to begin with. The re-roof looks good, but in the back side there is a lot of wear on the shingles already, I have since been told that they might be older shingles. They actually shingled right over our existing range hood vent, making it unusable. One of the flat roofs did not adhere at all to the building, and is bowed up about an inch and leaking. We picked up about 4lbs of roofing nails form all over our yard, enough to fill 3 sandwich bags. They finished and were paid in full in May 2016. When I originally contacted them about the problems I found, the owner came out to my house that week, assured me that they would take care of their mistakes within 2 - 3 weeks. I waited a full 5 weeks before contacting them by email, they never responded. I have now tried unsuccessfully to contact them by email, phone, or their company “contact us” page of their website, they have not responded at all in 4 months now. My biggest complaint about their company is the way they’ve handled this problem after the fact. They have been paid in full for their work, and they advertise satisfaction guaranteed, and they supposedly warranty their work, but are unable to send a text, an email, or pick up a phone to do their business in a professional matter. On top of that, I later found out that they never even pulled a permit to do the work, or get it inspected.

I'll start from time Northtown Construction took the awnings from my home. Subsequent to that time and not having heard anything, I started calling Mr. McKnight in early December. Each time I called, with the exception of one call, I was told that Mr. Mcknight was out of the office and that he would call me back ... which he never did. The only time I got ahold of Mr. McKnight was when he answered the phone himself when I called. At that time, he did not provide me with any explanation as to the delay or what was going on, only that he would get back to me later that day with some answers. He never called back and I left further requests for a call back which also went unanswered. On December 27, 2015, I sent an email to both Messrs. Young and McKnight expressing my frustration and concluding that since they had no intention of completing the contract that they were to immediately return and install the 2 existing awnings they took from my home as well as refund the $3,750 deposit I paid. The next day, I received a call from Mr. McKnight apologizing for not getting back to me and he provided me with a schedule for the completion of the project. He stated that the 2 existing awnings would be completed by the end of the week (by 1/1/16) and the new awning would be back from Sunesta in 10 days (by 1/7/16) at which time he would call me to schedule the installation of all 3 awnings. I asked Mr. McKnight to put that in an email and send it to me, which he did. In my reply to his email, I asked him to please let me know of any changes in the schedule he outlined. Everything went dark again. I heard nothing from either Mr. Young or Mr. McKnight and in early February I began emailing Mr. McKnight to schedule the installation of the awnings. After a couple of emails, I received a reply from Mr. McKnight stating that he was recovering from surgery and that he would have Mr. Young contact me. I immediately contacted Mr. Young via email as well as by phone. Again, no call back or response to my emails. In my final email to Mr. Young, I indicated that it was clear to me that he never intended to, or simply could not , complete the job. Further, that I needed to move on and demanded the immediate return of my awnings and the refund of my money. As noted above, since that time I have not received a response from either Mr. Young or Mr. McKnight nor have my awnings been returned or my deposit refunded. I want my awnings and money back. Even if Northtown Construction were to present all 3 awnings ready for installation today, I have absolutely no confidence that the rehab work they said they would do was done or done correctly. Moreover, it is obvious to me that they would never stand behind any of the work they did or would even follow up on any request for warranty repairs (Northtown Construction a/k/a Young Sign and Awning is the only authorized Sunesta Dealer in mid-Michigan).

Great Experience!! I had this company come out to inspect two leaks that showed after some bad weather. The roof wasn't very old, because I had just had it replaced two years prior with another company who wouldn't honor the warranty and eventually went out of business. They sent out a man named Pat who inspected the entire roof and even went into the attic... I remember this because no other company did that. He recommended removing the entire roof and said he didn't want to do the work unless I agreed to remove everything. I remember this as well, because he was the ONLY company that demanded this. His reason was because he saw some rotting evidence in the attic. He said he couldn't give a warranty by just going over the other company's work. I'm glad I agreed because when the guys removed the lower section, there was wet and soft wood. I was fortunate that it was only the decking and not the trusses and mold just started and was easily removed. Oh...almost forgot...the other company didn't use something called Ice and Water Blocker which according to Pat was a code violation. This company was on time and communicated with me the entire time. I am single and work during the day and Pat would call with updates while they were working. He told me everything that was a possibility to surface and then contacted me with the results... for instance, he mentioned that we may need to repair some wood and he took pictures and sent them too me while I was at work. I felt like I was right there. This company is like no other I've ever worked with. When I got home, one of the guys would explain everything that was done and even held the ladder so I could climb up and see. They left some extra shingles in case of weather damage in the future. They gave me a lifetime warranty and even gave me gutters on the front of my home. I mentioned to Pat that I had water getting into my basement and had a really big quote to get it waterproofed... guess what?... Pat gave me gutters for free on the front and that fixed the problem...saved me $12,000 in basement waterproofing... haven't had any issues and it's rained several times. This company is rare. They care about their clients...this was important to me since I am a single woman. I highly recommend Northtown Construction.

It was totally hard to deal with them and it took 3 weeks to have someone come in and this really blew us off. I am planning to file a case with a business bureau because they were completely dismissive and rude. When I said that I am going to complain with the business bureau, they said I can do whatever I want to. So I did. I complained to the Better Business bureau about it. It is the worst place to deal with.

I had a CertainTeed roof installed less than a year ago by Northtown Construction. Some shingles came off and nail popped out, but the company refuses to repair pursuant to warranty. A Northtown representative claims that someone climbed on my roof and ripped off five shingles and, therefore, it is not covered by warranty! Absurd . . . and a city inspector thought so too. Then, the representative insisted I pay for a bundle of shingles even though the warranty expressly includes roofing materials and labor. Later, the representative became belligerent after I requested as homeowner to be present whenever an agent comes onto the property. A word of caution: Some people are charismatic before the sale, and a warranty is good as the person or company making the promise. Judicial intervention may be necessary.