TR Smith Construction Inc

Awful. On October 22, 2015, I signed a contract with TR Smith Construction of Joplin, MO, to build my home. It was a cost plus 10% contract at a total cost of $263,699.70. The work started in April of 2016 with the projected completion date of August 31, 2016. On July 20, 2016, TR Smith contacted me and told me that he was terminating the contract. After the signing of the contract, I began having communication problems. I would call, text, or email and not get any response. I took it that since they were not actually building the house at that time that I was low priority and that once the building started, I would be able to get a hold of them better. I was wrong. I was never able to contact the actual owner, Tony Smith. Even after begging his wife to please have him call me. I would have to discuss things with his wife, which was difficult, because she worked at a car lot on most days. Wednesday was the only day I could truly catch her because that was when she stayed home and did the book work for the construction company. Originally, I was supposed to work with the owner’s brother in law which had been a school principal just a year ago. I later found out that his contract with the school district had been terminated due to some “shady” actions. Due to the brother in laws lack of experience in the construction field, I could never get any valuable information from him. Eventually, I was unable to get any type of response from him whether it was a text, call, or email. After dealing with this for a while, I emailed the company and requested to only deal with the owner or his wife. I never even received any confirmation from them about my letter, but just started directing all of my questions to the owner’s wife. The owner, Tony Smith, still never contacted me. During this time, work on the house slowed down and the cost of items and labor started going up. The cost for the footings was around $5000 over their bid. The labor cost for framing was $7000 over their bid. Framing materials were also higher than what had been bid. When questioning the wife about this, I was given unacceptable responses like that the framing labor included the garage and the roof over the porches. I pointed out that those things had been in the plan when they gave me the bid. I went on to tell her that in fact, I had not added anything new to the design but had taken off some things to try to lower the cost. Shortly after this, I was notified that they were terminating my contract. When I asked why, I was told that I was asking too many questions and that they felt like I was spying on them. I am living in Texas so I asked a friend to go by and take pictures of the progress. Therefore, they felt like he was spying on them. By this time, they were about 2 months behind schedule and almost 50% over budget. I wrote emails and called to ask them just to finish the house before walking off. I had already sold my house in Texas and needed to be there to help take care of my elderly parents. After no reply, I asked them to at least “dry in” the house. Stacks of shingles were laying on the roof. Finally, they agreed to that, thank goodness. I then asked when they thought the “drying in” would be completed so I could try and hire another builder. They did not even have the decency to answer my question. I frantically called around to make sure all the subcontractors had been paid. At least they made good on one thing. After T R Smith had finally exited my property, I headed back to Joplin to see what state my property was in and to try to hire another builder. T R Smith left so much trash and debris lying around it cost me over $400.00 just to clean it up. During the walk through with the new builder, I was heartbroken to find out that all the floors had to be sanded due to over exposure to water, the fireplace was not framed properly, bathroom window had to be moved, and there needed to be a foundation repair. I would highly recommend that if anyone is looking for a builder, DO NOT use TR Smith Construction. The brother in law kept bragging about all the houses they were working on, including the building of their own homes. I believe that they had too many homes to work on, and not enough people to do the work. TR Smith Construction is a small time builder, not a professional company able to handle that volume of homes. Since I live in Texas, I was the easiest person to drop. I also believe that the brother in law made up my bid sheet and underestimated everything just to get the job. Therefore, I don’t think they are professional or trustworthy enough to do even one home properly. My biggest reason for filing this complaint on TR Smith Construction is to ensure that no other potential consumer/veteran is deceived, duped, or hoodwinked like I was during the building of my home. I am still baffled that the contract I signed is not worth the paper it is written on. It is a shame to think that I spent 22 years in the military protecting the rights of people like T R Smith Construction so I can come back home and have them deliberately steal from me and my family. Sincerely, Richard Morgan (USAF RET)