Irish Construction

So I called this company about getting a bid for concrete. I get the answering machine at 4 PM on a Friday and it's like 30 seconds of music and then he has his actual vm. I was like "...um I was calling to get a bid until I heard your music and now I see how unprofessional your company is. Good bye." Well the guy CALLS ME BACK and gives me grief for saying that it was unprofessional and then calls me an a$$hole! I took a screenshot of his inbound call for proof!

They arrived promptly and completed the work in record time. It looks great, just like new.

Beware. Upon arrival to bid a patio replacement by Irish Construction, the first question I was asked was if I had another bid. When I answered yes, the next question was how much it was for. When I refused to answer that, stating that would not be competitive, he was obviously irritated and asked if it was $15k and I said it was much less than that, which it was (as was the next bid). He said that's what it would take without even reviewing my plans and stated he didn't need the work if he didn't get more respect than that, with an added comment about driving an hour to get to my house. It was quite an odd exchange, but I really don't think he was interested in doing my job unless I was willing to pay an hefty premium. Did show up a few minutes early, so an A for that! I'll look forward to an entertaining response.

Everything went well and work was completed ahead of schedule.

We had several companies listed on Angieslist give us estimates on applying stucco to our entire house. The estimates varied considerably, as well as the method of applications. The exterior had been painted when we purchased the house and there was considerable cracking and flaking. The bid from Irish construction for applying conventional stucco over the paint using a bonding agent was considerably less than the highest bid (which involved bonding a fibermesh prior to stucco), and slightly less than an estimate received from another company that wanted to apply some sort of synthetic stucco system. Reapplying paint was the other option. It was considerably less expensive, but likely would not last as long as a good stucco job. Therefore based upon the Angieslist reviews and the proposal from Tony that he would include chimney and dormer repair, we decided on having Irish Construction do the job. Our first concern about the quality of the work came when Tony started with the chimney and did the main ?repair? in a day. The chimney was in bad shape because the stucco had cracked and the bricks were deteriorating. Apparently he did not replace the bricks, but simply reapplied motor and stucco. They then began the rest of the house and again we were concerned with the prep work. They were supposed to remove any loose paint but seemed to spend a minimum amount of time on the surface preparation. They worked fast and were sloppy with clean up. They killed some of our neighbors grass by laying a tarp wet with acid on the grass and damaged some of our plants. Tony was not pleased when the dormer repair turned out to be more work than he anticipated (it was covered with siding and in worse shape than he thought). The west side of the house was in the poorest shape and the day that they started the final surface coat it was hot. Tony kept urging his workers to work fast because it could set up. When it was done it looked uneven, but we thought that it might even out as it dried. That assumption proved to be wrong, it is still uneven in color and texture. When they were done, parts of the house looked good, but others not so great. We asked Tony to rework the chimney and a side of the dormer because of some unevenness and cracking. Tony was in a rush because he was going to Ireland. Because of the rush we did not have a chance to do a through final inspection of the job, but he assured us if we found anything that needed to be done that we could call his plasterer. We spent a couple weekends cleaning up the mess they left; debris, stained concrete walks, windows splattered with stucco. Subsequently we did find some places that they missed or needed to be reworked. One was on the dormer because they did not remove a piece of siding that was attached to one side of a window. They also missed the upper portion of two basement window wells and several areas around the first floor windows. In addition, the coat on the front columns was so thin that there was some bleed-through staining the white stucco. We called Tony?s plasterer and he did come out to look at the things we wanted finished or redone. He admitted that he was not satisfied with the columns. He promised to return the following week. That was the last we heard. No one ever showed or contacted us. After the long winter we again contacted them by email. We received a reply, but no one has called or come by. Basically they never finished the job. The quality is variable; the front (except for the dormer) looks fine, but the sides of the house look uneven. Cracks have appeared in several places such as window corners that were not completely covered and on the west side where application was particularly variable. The chimney has not only cracked, but part of the stucco has come off in flakes. If they had responded to our request to finish the job and fix the problem areas, then we would have given them a better rating. However, as it stands, this is not possible. Edit: We have an invoice from Irish construction received July 18, 2013 listing the work performed and payment received. The balance due is $0. The last email received from Irish construction in response to our inquiry about finishing the job is dated March 13, 2014.

They did an awesome job at matching the mortar color so it blended in seamlessly with the rest of the brickwork. Tony showed up with a big crew and knocked all of the work out in one day including a thorough clean up of all of their work areas.

Called Irish Construction during business hours. Got voicemail. Left message of work I needed done (pour concrete patio), location of project (near Granite City, Illinois) and my name and telephone number. Never received any response. I assume he did not want to come to Illinois as it would cost more for mileage. If that is the case, then he should have returned my call with that information and indicate that he did not travel to Illinois on Angie's List. I certainly expected professionalism from someone who supposedly has an "A" rating on Angie's List. One wonders about the quality of reviews.

Tony and Richard took time on their Sunday afternoon to meet me and provide an estimate for the work to be done. They were able to start on the porch the next day. The crew showed up when they said they would. They were all very friendly, polite, and professional. They cleaned up after themselves at the end of the day. They had me step out periodically so they could show me how things were progressing. They returned the next day to complete the brick bases and hot tub pad. Again they arrived as expected and maintained their friendly, polite and professional demeanor throughout the day and cleaned up after themselves. Other companies were letting me know that it could take a month before they could have a crew out. I was pleasantly surprised when Tony and crew could start right away and were reasonable in pricing. I will definitely keep them on speed dial for future home needs. I would like to give a shout out to Tony, Richard, Jerry, Henry and Chico for not only performing good work but also for being incredibly charming in the process! I will definitely use them again, in fact, while Tony was out and checking on the job today I asked him about some repair that was needed on my deck. He informed me he could have his crew out again in the morning to make the necessary repairs. They exhibited very customer focused behavior.

When I called the company, the woman was very pleasant, listened to my problem, and worked with me through several dates to find a time that would work with my schedule. She suggested that we obtain multiple quotes and opinions from other contractors as well. I thanked her for her help in getting me a quick appointment. On the day of the appointment, I received a call from Tony 20 minutes before the scheduled time. I was not at the property yet (since it was 20 minutes early), and Tony was very rude from the beginning of the call. I calmly explained that I was out and planned to be there in time to meet him, and was only 10 minutes away, and can be there very quickly. I suggested that he take a look at the front step while we were on our way. I mentioned that we had had one other contractor take a look, and that we may not need to do a lot to the step afterall, but we wanted his professional opinion since we are not concrete/foundation experts....... at least, that was what I was TRYING to say, because as soon as I got to "we may not need to do much to the step afterall," Tony literally started yelling over me, saying "why the h*** did you have me come out here on a Saturday morning, I need to make a living, etc" and then the man actually hung up on me. After taking about 90 seconds to recover from the shock of being treated so rudely, I called him back and said that I was going to give him the benefit of the doubt that he had not just hung up on a potential customer, and told him that I was on my way and asked if he wanted to talk to me about the work or not. He said no. We talked for about 2 more minutes, and the conversation continued to blow me away as to how rude the man was. I explained to him that I had called his company first based on the excellent reviews on Angie's List, and that his own company told me to get other quotes about the project. He actually told me that if another person in the industry told me that there was no work to be done, then I was wasting his time. I told him that I wanted his professional opinion on whether work needed to be done, and he said "I don't give free advice." I was again blown away at his response, and explained that I have had many, many people come give me quotes on many, many projects - that is the process of choosing someone to work on your home. I told him that I have never been treated so poorly by someone that I was considering hiring, and that I was surprised that he would verbally undermine his own professional judgement at the same time. I apologized for "ruining his Saturday" and said goodbye. I am frankly shocked at the encounter. We are new to town, and are currently taking on many projects to fix up a 50 year old house in advance of moving in next month. We have found all of our work on Angies List, and have had some truly phenomenal experiences with some very professional and knowledgeable crews. This is the first time that I have felt compelled to write a negative review. While I'm sure that Tony is capable of doing fine work for customers based on his overall positive reviews, his volatility and willingness to treat someone he has never met so poorly by phone are enough to make me warn against hiring him.

Called Irish Construction for a bid to repair cracked stucco on foundation of my home. Appointment time was scheduled. They came out on time and immediately gave me a bid for the work. They came back the next day and completed the job. The work was A plus and they even repaired another area without charging extra. I will definitely call them again.

They were very very good, did a good job.

We live in a brick house in Webster with an attached brick front porch. The top of the porch is concrete slab, with conrete steps leading down to our main walk. From the walk, concrete steps lead to the driveway, while another set lead to the street / sidewalk. This past winter was a disaster for our porch and some repairs the previous owners made were crumbling and falling away. It looked as if the whole top of the porch was starting to disintegrate and water had gotten into various parts of the sidewalk, bricks and some retaining walls. We had been putting off the work for a while and it was clear it had to be done this spring. We got several referrals on work and I ended up finding Irish Construction via Angie's List. The other contractors all told me the whole top of the porch would need to come off and that we could be looking at close to $10,000 for all of the work. Tony with Irish came out within the same week of contacting his office. He was very thorough, asked lots of questions and had many suggestions. He gave me a quote on the spot for the porch and when I asked about the other work, he threw it all in for a very reasonable flat fee and told me he could have a crew there the next day if I wanted. Normally, a) someone quoting me a price on the spot and b) telling me they could have a crew out the next day would be red flags for me, but all of the positive reviews on Angie's List felt like somewhat of an insurance policy. My wife and I reviewed that night, call the office Friday, and the crew was at my house around 8:00 AM on Monday morning. Tony and his foreman showed up quickly after the crew arrived, reconfirmed the whole job with me, and then walked his crew through the job step by step. The work was completed in one day and two days after the crew came back to gather the tarps, ropes, etc. covering the new work. All work was to satisfaction and Tony stopped by during the project to make sure everything was OK with us as it was progressing. Overall we were extremely pleased with Irish Construction and would use them again.

I used Irish Construction last year for similar work. Both times they were quick to give me an estimate, were able to schedule the work in a matter of days, did a great job in a very timely manor. Highly recommend them.

Tony Monghan, the owner, showed up with a whole crew and they knocked out the work in one day. Irish COnstruct. is especially good at tuckpointing and they matched the mortar so well and did such a great job, I had them out to my company to work on our buildings.

Within 2 weeks of repair the path began to peel and separate. We called and asked it to be fixed, they came back, "fixed" it , still looks like it did before we hired them. Quality of the cement is terrible. Still cracked and peeling. NEVER USE THEM.

Irish Construction was phenomenal, from price to professionalism to the finished product. They carefully placed expansion joints along existing cracks in the concrete to make everything look neat as well as improve things structurally. The men were on time, friendly, trustworthy, professional, and cleaned up everything carefully. Best money I ever spent fixing my house.

The crew at Irish Construction works quickly. After meeting with Tony on Saturday morning to discuss work, they arrived promptly Monday at 8am. The work was predominantly completed in one day (with additional finishing work on a follow up visit). Tarps were used to protect the floors, and the site was cleaned and the floors were mopped before they left. The work was very well done, and the crew was courteous, prompt, and I'm very pleased with the results.

My wife and I are doing work on a 1906 brick home. The basement needed significant work to the foundation and the center support wall, as well as some cosmetic repair of the old parging. Prior to the work of the Irish Construction crew, I demoed a partially finished area of the 1700+ sq ft basement. Behind these walls, there was a lot of damage to the parging, and some areas where the walls and stonework had degraded. In addition, for most of the exposed fieldstone foundation, no mortar repair had been done in many, many years. Fieldstone basements use sacrificial lime mortar to prevent damage to the stone over the years, but the mortar needs to be repaired/replaced every 30 years or so with proper lime-based mortar. The center support wall was made of brick, and was also in severe need of pointing. In addition, at some point in the past, the beautiful arched windows in the basement had been filled in with more fieldstone. Tony and his core crew (Richard, Jerry, and Ryan) did the vast majority of the work, calling in extra help on a few days. This was a very big job, requiring removal of mortar several inches deep in the stone walls, and almost floor to ceiling replacement of mortar in all of the walls worked on. While underway, we decided to add a few more jobs, including removal of the stone in the window wells and installation of new windows. Although this was something that I planned on doing later, Tony's quote was very fair, and with all of the mess from the job it made sense to get it all done at one time. The results were incredible. The basement was transformed from a crumbling old dingy hole to a bright, functional workspace in the span of a few days. The foundation is in great shape, done with proper materials by a very capable crew. I'd like to say that each member of the crew was personable, courteous, and conscientious. Ryan was a blur, keeping everyone prepped and working at full efficiency, and had the unenviable task of cleaning up at the end. Despite being yanked in every direction, he always had a really positive and friendly attitude and was pleasant to talk to. Jerry did a large amount of the fieldstone mortar work, and was very careful to prep the walls and remove all of the crumbling mortar (in some places many inches deep) despite it being slow-going. His work was high-quality, and was a large part of the great final result. Richard was the foreman, and kept the team working while working himself. He was an absolute pleasure to deal with, and made sure to clearly communicate all of their progress to me. I am very pleased with the work, felt very comfortable with the crew, and will have them back for additional work when we do the next round on the house.

The pictures speak for themselves. When Tony and a couple of his workers came out to give us a quote, they looked at all the work that we wanted to be done, and quickly gave us a quote for about 3K less than another company had quoted us. It seemed like a great deal at the time, so we said ok. The work to be done was to smooth out the heavy texturing in the living room and dining room, skim a couple small hallways and a couple small walls in the kitchen, fill in three 10" holes from lights in the bedroom ceilings, fill in large holes from two bathroom cabinets, fill in holes from the bathroom lights, plaster over a small hole under the mailbox slot, and repair a damaged cove molding. I said that I would remove the small cabinets in the bathrooms, and remove the wallpaper paste that was in the bathrooms before they worked in there. We all agreed on everything and they left. Tony said that they would start the work in the living room the next day, so that night I removed the baseboards so that the new plaster could go all the way to the floor. When I came home that night I found out that all of the work was done that day, not only the living/dining room. At the time it was a pleasant surprise, until I noticed that they had plastered over the wallpaper paste in the bathrooms. When there were getting ready to leave it was later, and getting dark outside. Since so many lights were removed in so many rooms it was hard to see the issues with the work. They asked if there was anything else to be done, and since I didn't notice anything at the time, they left. The next day we started looking around the house, and started noticing several issues. The plaster in the living room was "pasted" onto the walls, so the electrical sockets are now sunk into the walls, not at the level they should be. The bottom edge was also very jagged, and there were sections that were so high that even after the baseboards would of been re-installed there would be 1" gaps in the plaster. In the hallways where the walls were skimmed the baseboards were never removed, and the plaster was covering them, so if they were ever removed it would crack the plaster and it would be uneven. The plaster over the mailbox hole and the cove molding was also cracked. I called Tony, and he sent a couple guys out that did all the work I pointed out to them. We were happy with the work at the time, but then again, it was dark outside again and we couldn't really see that well. About a week and a half later we were going to start painting all the walls. We saw that there were uneven spots in the plaster, random small holes all over the place, and spots of raised-up, excess plaster. We didn't want to deal with having any more workers in our house, so we spent about 30 man-hours sanding and scraping the walls to get the to the point we wanted. When we were getting ready to paint the cove molding, my wife saw that it didn't have a sand finish on it, like the rest of the molding did. When the cove molding was repaired for the second time, I was told that the finish comes from the paint, and not to worry about it. I didn't know any better, but my wife did, and she was the one who had pointed it out to me. I had gotten a few calls from Irish Construction over the previous week asking to put a review here on Angie's List. I didn't really want to, because I wasn't very satisfied with the final work, and we finished all the scraping and sanding ourselves. My wife had called so that someone could come out and put the finish on the molding, but the morning the work was supposed to be done, I received a call from the secretary saying that they would have to reschedule because Tony was caught up with another job. I called the day after that to find out when we could reschedule, and was told to call Tonys cell phone. When I called him about it, and he realized that he would be coming out to my house for the third time, he got upset. I told him that I wasn't happy with the work, but all I wanted was to get the sand finish on the molding and be done with it. When he asked me about why I hadn't put a review on here I told him it was because we had to put in so much work ourselves to finish the job, that he wouldn't like the review. He then began YELLING at me, saying that he has over twenty years of experience in construction, and that I didn't know what I was talking about. He also said that he gave me a great deal, so I should be happy that so much work was done. I then said that I didn't think that the quality of the work was worth the $5000 we paid. We went back and forth for about 5 minutes, until he ended by saying that he would be there in a few days to finish the work, and then he hung up on me. At this point I was very upset, so I tried calling him back several times. After the third or fourth time I left a message saying that I didn't want him in my house, and that I would get another company to finish what he started. I also told him that he would finally get the honest review he was looking for. After I had time to cool off I called him back. I'm guessing Tony listened to the message and knew that he didn't want an honest review online, because he said he would have a couple guys out to put the finish on. A couple days later, Tony called me and said that his "best two guys" were coming to work on the molding, for the third time. By the time I got home from work it was late, so I didn't even look at it until the next morning. What I saw that morning was terrible. The sand finish wasn't even the same texture as the rest of the molding, and there were 1/2" deep gouges in the molding and ceiling. I was furious, but waited until I had time to cool off to call, so that I wouldn't just start yelling. When I called I got a hold of the secretary, who said that Tony was gone for Thanksgiving until the 4th of December, but that she would pass my message along when he returned. I knew that we wouldn't be doing any work over the holiday either, so I said that was fine. On the third of December, I called to make sure that the message was passed along. I was told to call Tonys cell because he had returned the previous night, but because of my busy schedule, I just asked if he could call me back and leave a message on when someone would be out to fix the molding for the fourth time. Today, on the Forth of December, 2013, I received the following email: Tony would like me to tell you that it will cost $450.00 per day to come back to your house to do work that was not in your contract. Tony did the job $3,000 cheaper than your other bids. As it stands he made very little profit from this job. Thanks,Margaret I replied, saying that the cove molding was in the contract, and that we wanted someone to come out again because the work was done so poorly, but that we will be using another company to finish the work. To sum it all up, Irish Construction has been to our house three times to fix their work, and wants $450/day to come out for a fourth time fix what should of been done the second trip out. The prep work that was done all over the house was terrible. The cleaning that was done after the work was also terrible. I would only ever hire them to do work that doesn't need any prep, and that is impossible to mess up. Tony, the owner, has no professionalism. Even after all the calls and pictures I have emailed him about the work, he has only ever been to our house once, on the day he gave us the quote.

I'd use these guys again in a second - high scores in all areas. They were punctual. The initial estimate occurred one day after my first call, and when they said there would be someone out to do the job on monday morning - there he was, at 8:30 on monday morning. Compared to some of my previous contractors' behavior, this seemed like a small miracle. They have high standards in craftsmanship. The last folks who worked on my house didn't match the mortar color, and left the mis-matched mortar smeared all over my bricks just for good measure. Now that's all gone - thank god - and my house doesn't look like a crazy person lives here anymore. The last thing you want is a craftsman who can't tell the difference between "looks good" and "looks like a cow turd," but evidently they're the most common kind. If you want someone who has the good sense to know how to do a good job, I'd recommend Irish Construction. They're honest folks. Let me repeat: they're honest folks! My chimney, poor thing, was so badly screwed up by the previous owners that none of us knew, when Irish Construction started the job, that the real problem was far more massive than any of us could see. There was even more to it than that, but let it suffice to say that there was some ambiguity about how much I'd wind up paying, and it could have been a very awkward situation. But instead of ducking my calls and trying to screw me, the owner showed up to my house the next day, and we found a compromise that leaves me in good shape (considering where I started). House projects aren't easy. Sometimes, people don't screw each other: they get screwed together by the project. When that happens, it's all the more important to have good craftsmen who show up on time, sober, and ready to deal with you honestly.

The owner, Tony Monaghan was prompt, courteous, and highly professional. We have remodeled our home over the past 10 years and Irish Construction is the first and only group that we would ever use again! Refreshing to have work done by individuals who love what they do and make the homeowner the top priority. Work was completed started and completed on a Sunday under extremely cold conditions...not one complaint by the workers and they left the place spotless. Great to know there are still skilled craftsmen willing to work and get the job done beyond expectations. Honest price for an honest days work

Very friendly, responsive, prompt and honest. They came out immediately and gave a quick estimate on the spot. Showed up on time and performed work quickly and efficiently. There were some uneven and sloppy edges on the stoop. There were some boot prints on the sidewalk from workers stepping on it before it was dry. I think this happened when they ere trying to cover the work because it looked like possible rain. There were also some places on the chimney that were obviously missed on tuck pointing. I called about these problems after a couple of days and someone came out that same day to look at it. The tuck pointing was done and the workers evened up the jagged edges on the concrete repair. The only problem with this repair is that some new materials had to be mixed to make the patch. When it dried, it did not match the color of the other work they had done before so there is an area that looks like an obvious patch job. The worker assured me that since the boot prints were very shallow that they would disappear shortly and the uneven colors on the cement would blend as well. It has been about five months and the boot prints are still there and the color is uneven. Also the general color of everything is a yellowish brown color that I didn't expect. There is also some cement on the black metal handrail that was left and dried. Overall I still think they are a good company and do good work. I think they were a bit sloppy with my repairs. Although in general it looks good and is a vast improvement over what it was before, I am still not happy that there are visible boot prints on the sidewalk, dried cement on the hand rail and I'm not real pleased with the color. I would probably use them again but I would take more time and ask more questions. I also should have called again about the small problems but it looked good in general and I didn't want to ask them to make another trip to do more work, That is my fault.

As above. Work was done promptly and thoroughly.

The crew arrived ahead of schedule, completed all the work in one day, cleaned up after themselves, and were generally very professional. Tony and his men do quality work at a fair price. We will definitely call him again when we are ready for our next project.

I amvery pleased with the work done. The crew arrived with all the necessary tools and set straight to work. The work area was covered with tarps to make clean-up easier. While one crew worked outside on the chimney the other worked on the inside repairing the walls. Accomodating.Competent.Courteous,. This describes Tony and his crew. I especially appreciated that Tony came back to check on the work almost everyday. I am planning to have them back in the Spring to do more work on the houses. GREAT OUTFIT. D.Straley