Archie's Maintenance and Repair

We hired an overpriced General Contractor for a 10 x 7 bath full remodel. He and his family did "everything" required for the bathroom. Things seemed to be going well, for the most part - except for extensive delays because a change in design on the 7th day that was finalized by the 12th day (while demo was still in progress mind you) had apparently missed their window of availability to complete it within 3 weeks, as they then wouldn't be fully available again until 4/1 due to previous commitments. But, even once they were available on 4/1, very little was accomplished in the (3) weeks since, but we kept getting assurances of "we'll be hitting it hard next week...." Once the painting of walls & ceiling occurred by them, ALL of the flaws and imperfections in the drywall appeared. I addressed this with them and it wasn't received positively during the 2nd conversation with the husband. I was told "as long as the flaws couldn't be seen from 6 feet away, it was within industry standard..." I told him "we inherited enough flaws in our 65 year old home purchased in 2009, and we were not paying for new flaws that could be avoided/corrected with effort...." The following week, they seemed to come back with a fresh mindset after I offered to spackle and re-prime as long as they repainted. He assured me they would take care of it all. Last week, when talking to them, it seemed very apparent that they "considered the drywall repair and re-painting to be completed". I knew I couldn't live with the results as there were still a LOT of flaws left and they caught my eye every time I walked in there, and we had invested way too much money to settle for "industry standard" so I decided to tackle it myself after all over the weekend. After 12-15 hours each day, by Sunday evening I was exhausted but was ready to push thru the evening to get it done by the time the team returned Monday and they would be "none the wiser" to what had occurred during the weekend. At 7:45pm I opened the ceiling paint can I had for a couple years that I thought was sealed and ok, to discover the rim had rusted. I ran to Lowes to get new paint with only minutes to spare before they closed. Valspar changed their formula and now includes primer and a tint so you can see where you've painted vs. haven't. Within 20 minutes of finishing the 1st coat, I was horrified to discover that the EXTRA/ULTRA White was actually an Off White / Cream..... I called Lowe's Manager the next day, whom I've dealt with on many occasions including a full kitchen remodel in 2009, and explained the situation to him. He put Robert in touch with me, and told him to "take care of her". Robert came on the 1st and 2nd days in the evening after his other commitments were fulfilled and worked very hard. By the 3rd morning, he completed the job and I could finally have peace of mind that I wouldn't have to look at those flaws every time I was in the "overpriced" bathroom each day. Which while it is nice, it is not exquisite or elaborate enough to warrant the price the General Contractor is charging us. Lesson learned! Robert is a very hard worker, takes a lot of pride in his work, and really cares about what he does and the happiness of his clients. We're so blessed to have found him and will be using him for all future painting, as well as other projects since he has experience in those areas too and it was apparent from his thoughts on the bathroom's drywall results, that he knows what he's doing, what was wrong with it and what should've been done to correct it from the start. I will write a review on the General Contractor once the job is completed as I need them to finish it and do a good job on what is left....