SCHULZ CONSTRUCTION

Mr. Schulz's quality of work on the bathroom, which was never finished, was sub-par (and that's being nice), he claimed that there was dry-rot in several of the main wall studs to the dining room, and said that "for only a couple thousand more in materials, we'll tear the whole structure down to the foundation and build new--you'll save on labor." He tore half of the house down to the foundation, just started to do the rebuild, demanded the difference of the estimate (approximately $15,000 more) and would not accept the $1,000/ month that had been agreed to (even though we were paying him $1400/month). He walked out on the project at the beginning of Minnesota's wet season, with the remaining structure very poorly protected form rain. We sustained multiple tens of thousands of dollars water damage to family heirlooms, building materials, existing structural members, etc. He then had the gall to try to sue us for another $4500, feeling that our maintaining payments and actually demanding he do the work he had been paid so much for wasn't enough. We counter-sued, and in the end found out that he was WAY under insured, and does not carry proper insurance for the work he does, but work-site liability ONLY. We since had to re-do a lot of what he DID do, finding that he actually had no idea of how to properly handle I-joists, and had no idea that when working on a 100+year old structure that everything is custom fitted--he took his circular saw to my brand-new I-joists and zipped them off at the primary room length--then found that as the room went, it widened slightly--there is a gap at the main floor support now. We discovered this as we had to tear up 24 sheets of tongue-in-groove plywood to replace it all, as it was water-damaged, peeling, and separating. His method of removing wiring was to simply run his sawzall through it, sparks and all "Huh, that one was still live, I guess." We had to do the work ourselves, re-building the house as we were able to find help. The house is NOT liveable, and has not been since he started the "work." After he walked out on us, we noticed very obviously that there were materials missing, but as we had not kept a piece-by-piece running inventory as he "worked," we have no idea as to how much he actually took.