PETER THORN BUILDERS

Pete was very professional and thorough..he is an excellent listener. He was very clear about what information he needed and what would happen. In the case of one appliance he installed, the parts i had were not quite correct and he was able to make adjustments to ensure that the item functions properly. He was very careful to clean up afterwards too...especially important after the plumbing repair and dishwasher installation in my kitchen! I really appreciate his advice and thoroughness with his consultations...he is very careful to find out what is actually so rather than operating on assumptions...I have a number of things in my home that were built or installed by previous homeowners and not to code which need to be repaired..and has worked with me each time to develop solutions which fit my both home and my budget. I have a big kitchen remodel planned, and he will absolutely be the first contractor I call.

We are a little more than mid way in the process. Peter is quite detail oriented during the planing phase. He does not charge fort this service and it helps the home owner and Peter align around what will be required to complete the job to the home owner's standards. The design process and wait prior to starting took longer than I would have liked, but the job ahead of us ran long which delayed our start. Once the team got moving, it's been going along very well. The crew are all polite, thoughtful men who check in with us routinely to be sure we are apprised of their progress and what to expect next. They are such great guys that it almost feels like they've become part of the extended family. Foreman is a delight to work with. Can't say enough about their commitment and professionalism. We receive detailed bills and progress reports in writing allowing us to assess our progress both in terms of work as well as budget. I am delighted with the work done on our basement to date and can't wait to see the finished project!!

We have great confidence based on his design work that he will orchestrate the remodeling with high standards. Specifically, in response to our request for a bid, he took the initiative to make sure that the remodeling work would meet the standards of the county health department (septic system), building inspection department, and one other agency. Secondly, he developed floor plans for inside use which revealed to us the value of completely changing the entrance to the building to a side entrance. He was amenable to modifications that we suggested as well. His attention to detail has resulted in a cost estimate that is likely to be much closer to the final cost than one might expect, since every sub-contractor's work has been carefully estimated and incorporated into the contract, and has shared with us the computer-based flow-chart showing when each phase of the remodeling would be scheduled. He seems to have knowledge of most of the systems involved in building a residence and has figured out how to integrate the systems of the outbuilding into the existing main house (water, sewer, electrical, TV, internet, etc.). I will write another review after the work itself has been completed (or revise this one if that is permitted).

Replacement of the water damaged siding was rather hard to get at but an obvious solution. For the woodpecker holes I had suggested using a metal flashing (as I had used once before) but one of Pete's guys suggested a much neater fix. They used 'great stuff' foam, then cut the expanded foam flush to the siding, sealed it with caulking and painted it over. If you didn't know where to look, you could not find the patches! While waiting for everything to dry they used their tall ladders and changed a couple, hard to get at, security lights. Thanks guys.

Overall, the job went extremely well. Because I live in a historic district, the regulations on building are very strict and caused a couple of delays, but Pete Thorn Builders worked through all of these and went above and beyond to get the job done. The main thing I was impressed with was their attention to detail. They found creative solutions to the restrictions put on them by the town and made sure that every little thing in our theater was perfect. Pete helped us to plan out the room exactly how we wanted, and Mike did an amazing job with the construction. I was very impressed and am already planning to work with them again in the future.

Clients are thrilled with the consultative nature of Mr. Thorn and the quality of his work.

Pete has helped us with getting our house into the rental market, finding renters, and managing them. Although I found it difficult to get my point across at times during the initial phase of repairs and painting, overall he's been helpful. Our renters are not easy. He quickly: forwards any emails they've sent, investigates their claims quickly, and gives us his opinion regarding those claims, as well as what he thinks will work as a compromise. I recommend him.

The quality was good and the work was completed in a timely fashion. Everything was above board with respect to permits and inspections. Pete was very thorough and was always easy to get on the phone / email. You could probably get the work done cheaper, but my hunch is you would be cutting corners. No complaints overall.

Pete was the first contractor to respond to our Service Magic request and his initial visit set a high benchmark for the other contractors who followed. For example, during that first meeting, he offered to take us to a nearby job that was similar to ours. That day, he introduced us to his crew and customers. In contrast, the other contractors who responded were reluctant to let us meet owners (previous customers) face-to-face and would not take us to an active job site. Pete was the only respondent to return with a sketched proposal. This showed us that he was a good listener and the drawing enabled us to discuss the project in greater detail. By contrast, another contractor returned only with a contract for us to sign in advance of any further discussion (he made it sound perfectly legitimate, but, having just experienced Pete's can-do approach, we could not imagine accepting anything less). We quickly learned that our eyes (and imagination) were bigger than our stomach (our very conservative guestimate of what we'd like to spend on the project). I suspect this phenomenon is quite common: Before we began, we "guessed" at what we might be willing to spend to get what we wanted. Pete was very conscientious about letting us know during the planning/design phase what the cost impact might be (say, to go from a one-car to a two-car garage, or adding a picture window upstairs) before revising preliminary drawings and estimates. I have to give him high marks for alerting (and reminding) us of the cost impact of our requests. I'm sure it is a difficult task to keep every owners' expectations in check, nonetheless, we really appreciated seeing the detailed worksheets for materials and labor, itemizing the impact of our request. Before we authorized the work to begin, Pete sat down with us and took us through the complete project line-by-line and page-by-page (drawings, cost details, schedule). He made sure that we understood and agreed with the exact scope of work and project cost before we signed off on moving forward. I think the nature of any renovation includes some uncertainty about what's behind a wall or buried in the ground, which one can never know for sure until a wall is demolished, or you start excavating. Pete did an excellent job anticipating these obstacles with a bit of line-item padding in the estimate so, for example, when the footings on our existing carport slab proved insufficient to support a two-story structure there was sufficient reserve in the estimate to handle the additional labor and materials to meet structural requirements. I think we were lucky in that a) Pete had the foresight to recognize many unknowns; b) he devised an economical solution to the problem; c) of all the gotchas that could come up during a renovation, those that occurred in our project were not that costly. Once construction began, Pete's people were on site at the crack of dawn. They were polite and tidy and said 'hello' and 'goodbye' as we came and went. The jobsite was kept orderly and all refuse was kept in the dumping trailer that Pete brought in. I must confess that as the project began, my wife and I grew very excited by the prospect of having a new garage and bonus room and the more we thought about our dream becoming a reality, the more we asked Pete to make little adjustments and enhancements that expanded the scope of work. We learned that just because a wall exists only as a line drawn on a piece of paper doesn't mean that moving that wall incurs no cost -- there's a lot of engineering that goes into every single line on a set of construction documents and some seemingly modest changes can require additional review and approval by structural engineers and building inspectors (all of which cost time and money). It would have been unreasonable of us to ask for any change however modest and expect it to have no impact to project cost or timeline. Pete was always good about letting us know the ballpark time/cost impact of our "modest upgrades" before accepting our authorization to proceed with redesign and revised cost estimating. When it was time for us to approve each change, Pete dutifully sat us down and reviewed it all line-by-line, just as he did during the initial authorization of work. My wife and I were, of course, quite busy and there were times when we would have preferred just to phone-in the go-ahead, but Pete trained us well, insisting that each change be approved by us in writing only after a complete briefing on its impact to cost and timeline. One thing I really appreciate about Pete is his attention to detail and quality. He recommended premium materials and took the time to differentiate their value to us and to our home. For example, we could have gone with cheaper roofing materials than Kevlar sheathing "felt" and for that matter we could have left part of the old shingled roof instead of re-shingling the whole thing, but the peace of mind we obtained by doing it right with materials that last was priceless compared to the small increase in cost. There were some items we splurged on: Half-way through, we decided on premium carpet upstairs instead of a painted floor. Since the bonus room was to be heated and air conditioned and our whole-house HVAC system was nearing its end-of-life, we bit the bullet and purchased a multi-zone HVAC system for the entire house (definitely not in the initial budget). We wanted to use the garage as a year-round playroom so we added insulation and a mini-split heater/AC for the garage. My wife was concerned about noise from my rock-and-roll garage band leaking back into the house so we double-wrapped the garage walls and ceiling with sheetrock. Also, we chose premium Hardy board siding instead of Masonite. We also decided that a concrete driveway leading up to our new garage would be much nicer than our old gravel driveway, so Pete added that to the scope of work, as well. These were costs (and timeline extensions) that we knowingly added to the project (Pete certainly would not have added them on his own without our approval) and we are so glad we did, because, in the end, we got exactly what we asked for! Even with these adjustments, I believe we still came in below revised budget and timeline. We simply cannot imagine another contractor matching Pete's creativity, attention to detail and professionalism. Since our project was completed, a number of our neighbors have also used Pete's company for their house projects. The neighborhood is really looking up.

Overall great. Pete was very impressive over the phone and in person. My brother and I went through about 5 contractors and and over twice as many subs to find out how to remodel our basement best. We knew we wanted to do part of the work ourselves and Pete was more than willing to work with us on that. He gave us the most realistic estimate and was genuinely concerned about saving us money. We ran into a few snags, to be expected, and Pete handled them very well. In any renovation project unforseen problems will arise and you want a GC that can handle them like Pete. Thing really couldn't have been done any faster, Pete had some great contacts and subs that came in to do work quickly and well. He was also familiar with all of the permit issues necessary and we ended up getting done on schedule and now have renters. I hindsight I can't imagine our project going any better.

They were on the spot. They did a great job and had some good suggestions. They followed up with any issues that we may of had. We were very satisfied with them.

He was great. The work was satisfactory.

They arrived when they said they would, got the work done essentially in the time frame predicted, and cleaned up COMPLETELY when they were done. I could not be more satisfied! Pete will discuss all the options with you so that you can decide exactly what it is you want to do. He explains things and does not talk down to you - an approach I found really refreshing for a building contractor. If you want someone that you can trust and does top quality work, you can't go wrong hiring Pete Thorn.

The first part of the process was tearing out the rotted area to determine the full extent of the problem. After this was done, Mr. Thorn suggested engaging Wells Inspection Service to document the extent and cause of the damage. As a result of this inspection I was able to recover approximately half the repair cost (not including the replacement of the floor.) The work on the area of original cause of the need for repairs seemed to go smoothly and relatively unobtrusively. The vinyl siding was removed carefully and reused, saving the necessity of replacing the entire house's siding (color probably not matchable.) The window was also saved. Materials were obtained and delivered without any apparent need for delay once work started. There was some inconvenience regarding access, since the repair area included the front door and steps/stoop area. Generally, the work was quite unobtrusive, although unavoidably noisy. Replacement of the beam was smoothly done, in the corner of the house diagonally opposite of the other repairs. After the repair construction was completed, the interior wall was painted satisfactorily. Repair and remodeling of the master bath was disruptive because of the need to do piping, then install the tile and wait for it to dry, then finish the sink and toilet and let its caulking dry, then paint the molding. Replacing the soffit with eaves was more extensive since it was on the entire perimeter of the house. One problem that occurred was some damage to the edge of the ceiling of the rooms along the back of the house. It turned out that the ceiling rafters at the back wall were not present, so the ceiling board was floating at the back edge, and there was nothing to nail to. CSI repaired the damage at no additional cost. Mr. Thorn was able to recommend a method of roofing over the added area of the eaves at a lower cost, which by this time of the project was certainly welcome.

Please see our August 3, 2012 Addendum in response to Mr. Thorn's "Provider Response" (directly below our original report) Peter Thorn was a friend for 20 years. We knew he was a builder and trusted him. At our request, Mr. Thorn informally inspected this house and others when we were looking; many systems that he originally said were ?fine? he later claimed needed expensive repair or replacement, such as the HVAC system. While he told us that he was not familiar with coastal contracting and FEMA, this was a bigger problem than we realized. 10 weeks before closing, Mr. Thorn stated that he would begin work the day after we closed on the house; he started 3.5 weeks late due to ?other priorities.? Work by Thorn/CSI (Construction Supervision Inc= his firm's name) was slow & expensive. Mr. Thorn advised expanding ?scope of work? at every turn and used expensive materials, which were often poorly installed. Much work needed to be redone and all corrective work was billed at full rate. He uncovered areas that needed repair but did not allow inspection by us before demolition, despite specific requests and prompt availability. Despite stating he would provide ?before? and ?after? photos of corrective repairs, over 8 months we received none. He advised interior remodeling concurrent with other work for economy. He kept telling us his preferences and choices; his use of the term ?showplace? unnerved us. He fired a worker after the project started, and said that this would not cause delay. A month later he hired his stepson and despite our explicit objections and fear, quartered this man in our house- who later left of his own volition, leaving bottles and debris. His foreman was quartered in the house for much of the project (which we reluctantly agreed to, after persuasion from Mr. Thorn); this ?foreman? lost his key and broke into the house twice, damaging new sliding doors. Mr. Thorn played us against each other, misrepresenting the other person?s statements and agreements. He accused us of lying about payments made directly to his bank. He said on several occasions, ?This is always a nightmare.? We should have taken him at his word and fired him right then. His workers destroyed our lawn irrigation system while working under his direct supervision, and damaged the foundation of our house during installation of new garage door, then tried to cover it up with putty. Mr. Thorn did plumbing work himself, much of which needed to be repaired or replaced. One area leaked >10,000 gallons per month, generating a $564 water bill for 12,230 gallons for one month. Mr. Thorn had a detailed plan for each stage but every week saw delays. Finish date was extended ?another 2 weeks? multiple times. We began dealing directly with subcontractors in order to get work completed. We eventually hired other workers separately to finish, including the outdoor concrete aprons, flooring, painting, and repair of substandard work. Mr. Thorn refused to explain what he was doing, was unresponsive to our requests, and sometimes was not on-site for weeks. In March 2011 we requested him to explain his latest invoice and he replied ?I don?t have time to explain.? Subsequently we checked his invoices in more detail: there were items on bills not backed up by receipts, duplicate billings, and subcontractors or suppliers were not paid the full amount shown on invoice (600+ pages of billings over ~26 weeks itemized), with tens of thousands of dollars of discrepancies. We requested him to leave when we received a Certificate of Occupancy. We attempted to negotiate an end to our contract with Mr. Thorn, and he reneged on this settlement agreement and placed a lien to obtain more money. To complete a legal ending to our ?cost-plus? contract with Mr. Thorn, we had to pay him a small settlement plus directly paid several subcontractors & vendors in duplicate of what we had already paid Mr. Thorn. In summary, hiring Peter Thorn/CSI Builders drained our savings and our peace-of-mind. We wish we?d checked references and gotten bids from other builders before we hired Mr. Thorn. Do not sign a ?cost-plus? contract (no incentive for economy, timeliness, or quality); get bids from other builders; check references for all work in last 5-25 years (ask for Capricorn Builders, Construction Supervision Inc, as well as Peter Thorn Builders). Consider Mr. Thorn?s advice about further work & cost of materials and labor with caution. Addendum August 3, 2012: Mr. Thorn?s ?Member Response? glosses over key details. We can document our statements. Mr. Thorn accompanied us and our realtor to inspect 4 older houses (addresses available) in May 2010; Mr. Thorn repeatedly stated that this house had ?good bones? and that major structures and systems were in good condition. He offered advice on type of real estate contract and provided a statement about replacement cost of decks. Mr. Thorn further stated in May, June, and July 2010 that he had ?no work? and would start construction immediately (his words: ?boots on the ground the afternoon of closing?); closing was August 25, actual start date September 27, 2010. Work on initial contract was not complete by early December; we have an e-mail from Mr. Thorn dated March 4, 2011 titled ?handoff plan? which includes work on front porch and sunroom, and also photos documenting incomplete work: front porch on 12/19/2010, the decks on 2/11/2011, and the sunroom on 3/1&4/2011. We hired paint and flooring contractors due to slow progress by Mr. Thorn. The painter repaired interior drywall and exterior siding damaged by Mr. Thorn, not the opposite as Mr. Thorn asserts. Mr. Thorn was not given a punch list because we knew that we would be billed and re-billed, as occurred earlier in the project, if we gave him our list of 50-60 items requiring repair. Repairs ranged from incomplete structural details to split wood to plumbing leaks and more. Mr. Thorn continued work after Certificate Of Occupancy April 4, 2011; his invoices show materials purchased April 5 and hours billed through April 9. We have 496 pages of bills from Mr. Thorn. Review of invoices #1-25 totaling $220,873.74 paid to Mr. Thorn by March 24, 2011 revealed $38,261.63 of items billed without receipts; $5,040.95 items with mismatch in receipt and invoice, always in Mr. Thorn?s favor; and $1,128.06 in duplicate billings. Other Angie?s List members writing subsequent to our December 2011 review comment on Mr. Thorn?s detailed invoices. Obviously check them carefully and regularly; we were far too trusting. Construction costs as of March 24, totaling $220,873.74 paid to Mr. Thorn, calculate to $231.77 per square foot. Mr. Thorn additionally billed us $38,169 on invoices #26-29. On settlement, we paid subcontractors $14,942.83 directly because on prior invoice #20 HVAC had received only $9,662 of $11,966 itemized and we re-paid HVAC the discrepancy of $2,304 during settlement. We also paid Mr. Thorn a small sum. The BBB report that Mr. Thorn describes as ?vicious? is similar to our original December 2011 Angie?s List report: an account of our disappointment in Mr. Thorn?s work. House Data: Original area: 1500 heated square feet second story with 1500 unheated square feet at ground. Mr. Thorn?s construction: a) 800 square feet new: 220 sq ft sunroom (13.5x16.5) with roof; 430 sq ft decks with stairs and railing; 150 sq ft front porch with roof and elevator shaft, roof over; and b) 153 square feet of remodeling (bathrooms 95 and 40 sq ft, closets x2 @18 sq ft x2). Mr. Thorn hired insulation and drywall contractors for the basement. Please note that Mr. Thorn's mention of "1,000 sq ft and additional 2,863 sq ft" is more square feet than exists at this location.

i called the company and asked them to wash my windows. we set up a date and they came and washed them. they are very courteous and professional. I have used the company before and will again in the future.

It frustrated me because I told them exactly what type of remodeling we were going to, what we were looking for, and what type of estimate we were looking for. We scheduled a time and he came out. He said that he didn't bring anything to do any measurements but told me what they did. He said they did the measurements and then drew up a plan. I needed a plan so that I could compare apple to apple with other contractors. The first meeting was a waste of time. I agreed to let him come back out and do the plans so that we could get numbers. There was a lot of back and forth communication and ultimately he decided that he did not want to do the job. I would recommend him to family and friends only on the basis that they would not be involved in the project at all and would hand over everything to him. Overall, he does good work. It just didn't work out for me. I probably would not use him in the future.

They showed up when I expected them to, did a great job, and cleaned up after themselves. Pete prepared very detailed invoices listing every item they bought for the job (with copies of receipts!). He is extremely thorough and I trust his advice on what to do and how to do it. As the job got more involved (when more rot was uncovered) he took photos to show me the exact problems and explained to me what the next steps would be.

We talked a little bit, but did not get to the stage of him giving me a price because we were going to have him come back as we were having some other work was going on. Our plans ended changing, so we decided not to schedule a second consultation. We decided to call them out for an estimate because of the reviews they had on the list. They were very punctual, answered all my questions, followed up with me afterward and I was very satisfied.

I thought that the crew was really great, and they were usually accessible. I felt that their price was high, and I did not like the individual owner also. The owned did a bad job presenting himself.

I wanted to have a frog room, which had been divided, restored to one room. Peter worked with me and provided different possibilities for the room. We did discover some deficiencies in the original wiring of the house, which required some additional time and expense but I was informed of this at the time. Had we not encountered this problem, the work would have been completed on schedule and on budget.

They did an overall good job. Peter himself was informative and courteous with whom I actually met with.

Pete and Rush (his foreman) are great to work with. This was the second time I had used them, the first being to replace rotten siding on the exterior of the house. The attention to detail is superb - you can rest assured it will be done RIGHT! With the hood installation, there was an additional problem with the existing wiring which took extra time and materials. The problem was shown to me and explained to me ahead of time, so although the original estimate was exceeded, the need for the additional work was very clear. I received a copy of each and every receipt for materials and detailed breakouts of the time spent. The installation was excellent, including the work done on the vent outside the house, which was painted with some leftover exterior paint I had in the garage so it matches perfectly!

IT went extremely well. Not one bad surprise or bad experience. I recieved a letter from my homeowners association complementing me on the excellent job.

Fantastic!! I can't tell you how highly I think of this company. Not to be dramatic...but Pete potentially saved our lives by identifying the carbon monoxide issue. Matt, who fixed the venting issue and sealed the ducts was amazing. Very conscientious and provided absolutely quality work.