Cape Fear Kitchen and Baths

met with James and discussed what we wanted. He said he would email us that evening and call the next day. He never got back to us with a proposal or to even say that they did not want the job. Very unprofessional. .

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They know what they are doing, they did an outstanding job on our bathroom and we are very pleased with that! I would hire them again to do the bathroom.

UPDATE 1/31/2015 The contractor came by with another tile subcontractor. To his credit he offered to correct the problems with the tile work including demolition of the work previously done and reinstallation of the shower and tub surround. 1, 2, 3, 4 DEMOLITION The demolition of the existing shower, floor, and bathtub surround went well. They were neat and did not leave debris. They did not track a lot of debris through the bedroom or rest of house. They were not too noisy. They cleaned up after themselves daily. They did damaged the towel bar in the bath tub area. We will need to replace that. 5. SHOWER SYSTEM INSTALLATION The preparation of the plumbing and installation of the shower system went well. We did not get the exact version of the Delta Shower System we had requested. The contractor's supplier could not provide it because the manufacturer discontinued the specific diverter we wanted. The complete system as we requested it was available through several on-line plumbing suppliers with a quick delivery. We told the contractor where it could be obtained. The parts came in piecemeal. Not sure if it was their ordering or the supplier they used. This had a minor impact on the preparation for tiling. Overall good grades for this work. We accepted the shower system as supplied. 6. SHOWER PAN Installation of the shower pan went well. The shower pan was exactly what we expected. 7. SHOWER NICHE The niche for the shower alcove was built as we requested it. The contractor made it tall enough to accomodate most brands of shampoo. We will give them good grades for this. 8. TILE WORK Floor: The preparation of the floor for tiling was adequate. They used a leveling mixture to cover the imperfections in the existing floor. It was put down as the floor tile was laid. We believe it should have been put down on the entire floor so that the surface was uniformly level. Floor tiling was OK, not great. The tiles are not evenly laid and grout lines are not even. I don't believe spacers were used. Tile cutting was not square were it needed to be. There were variations from one edge to another edge in the linen closet and around the door jambs. The door jambs were cut too high leaving large gaps that need to be filled. Some jambs were so badly cut they needed to replace the door trim. Walls and Surround: The overall preparation of the areas to be tiled was not good. The contractor installed backer board in the shower alcove and tub surround. The problem was that the backer board was not thick enough to meet the existing dry wall above the area to be tiled. It was off by 1/4 to 3/8 inches. We pointed this out to the contractor. He said he would add extra mudd to level the area. He only applied the mudd to the area where existing wall board and backer board met. We mentioned this again and told him that the tiles would tilt forward from 1/4 to 3/8 inch at the top. He ignored our comments. The contractor could have added a 1/4" backer board which would have brought the two surfaces much closer together. Had he not already started to tile the walls. This turned out not to be an option. We had contracted for a row of decorative trim in the shower and tub surround. We provided the decorative tiles. The decorative tiles were thinner than the 12 x 12 and bullnose tiles. The contractor tried twice to lay the decorative tile without success. The contractor did not mention the problem that we would have with the thinner tile and the backing material on them. The mudd was too thick and the uneveness in the surfaces made it impossible to lay the tiles correctly. We had to scrap our plans for this. The contractor removed the deocrative tiles and bullnose in the bathtub area. He laid a double layer of 12 x 12 tiles to correct the deficiency in the wall thickness. The contractor suggested an alternative which was to cut the 12 x 12 tiles in half lay them for a subway effect. We reluctantly accepted this solution. After this work was done, we found out that there were two decorative tile options that were a companion tiles to our 12 x 12 tile. They could have been used to give us the decorative element we wanted. The tile work in general was not good. Tiles were cut uneven, varying from 1/4 to nearly a half inch off. In the corners the tiles sometimes touch each at the top (or bottom) and didn't butt well. Because the tiles were individually buttered some jutted out from oneanother. Tiles were put up using spacers and slivers of cardboard. This approach resulted in uneven spacing between rows of tiles. There was no planning of the tile work. Thus, the tile laying was not uniform from a center line along the back wall. The niche is not square. The upper edge runs up hill. In some places it appears that chipped tiles were used. Grout work is uneven, with too much in one spot and not enough in another. Tile work on the edges of the tub surround are awful. The contractor should have discussed with us how he was going to approach the treatment of the edges before he started. He used caulking to fill in where grout should have been. 9. Baseboard and Shoe & Finish Work: This was well done. Great miters. Repair of the wall near the shower was awful. The shoe was used to cover up poor cuts in the floor tiles. 10. Door: The Master Bath shower door was supposed to be a semi-frameless pivot pin hinged door. We were told on the day that it was to be installed they couldn't get it. It would be two-three weeks. They suggested we use a bypass sliding glass door, which they could get. We reluctantly agreed to this change. The door we got was a Kohler and was good quality. The finish was supposed to be chrome we ended up with a polished aluminum door. Kohler does not make chrome. Not what we wanted but we can live with it. Some final thoughts: The workers were at all times clean and neat. They were pleasant and courteous. The staff complained to the owner we interferred with their work. We don't consider asking questions and pointing out problems, interference. They did ignore some of our suggestions or requests. The job took longer than we expected. The company offered to repair a small area of wall near the shower. They did offer to get us the door we wanted, but suggested it would cost us extra. What is disturbing is that the company president thought this was an acceptible quality of workmanship and did not offer to fix any of the tile problems. He took $100 off the bill because they did not install a grab bar which was part of the contract. We plan to hire another contractor to fix the tiling that we are not happy with.