Kathy Kotz Home Builder Inc

In 2014 we had a Family Room addition to our home constructed by Kathy Kotz Home Builder Inc. This room, approximately 200 square feet in size, is now one our favorite places to relax. It has beautiful hardwood oak flooring, a gas fireplace, ten tall casement windows with removeable grilles, and a pair of interior french doors opening to an adjacent room. The exterior features a hip roof and wood cedar siding that matches seamlessly with the original siding on our house. Our contractor, Kathy Kotz, was a pleasure to work with. She clearly explained the details of the project from start to finish and proposed a price that was reasonable and competitive with other companies. Throughout the building process Kathy's workers were professional, punctual, courteous, and highly skilled in their areas of work. My wife and I requested a few changes as the project progressed and Kathy made those transitions smoothly. She made it a priority to oversee the constuction on a daily basis and it was clear that she was highly respected by her workers. When the room was completed my wife and I both agreed that it turned out even better than we had anticipated.

It took a month as quoted. Prior to the job starting, Kathy took me shopping for all materials, her suggestions were extremely helpful. Once the job started, Kathy scheduled all the contractors (demo/plumber/carpenter, tile installer and painter), checking with them daily as to the progress, stopping by the job at least 3 times a week and keeping me informed as to who was coming when, including all delivery of materials. All contractors were very professional and cleaned up at the end of each day. I was very comfortable leaving my home while these contractors were working. Kathy was always reachable and I really appreciated all of the time she spent with me. I couldn't be happier with the results.

This 5 month project turned into a 16 month nightmare. The entire project consisted of us going to the site every single day to find yet another short cut/deviation from the blue print of the house we were paying this builder to build. Just one mistake after another. She didn't dig the basement deep enough to accommodate the first floor drop downs which resulted in a pump to get the water out to the the septic system. It has already been replaced once and serviced twice. She put gables where the hips were supposed to be and hips where the gables were supposed to be. The entire roof had to be taken down and reordered. Ceiling fan hitting cupboard doors in laundry room. Water running down sheet rock in family room. Water on hardwood floors coming in from under the door in family room. Main support beam in basement needed to be reinforced when the home inspector we hired found it was not in code. Put wrong insulation in attic , had to remove it and put in what was contracted for. Sub contractors were poor. Instead of using a saw to cut holes for the wiring and pipes ............ they used a hammer to simply smash through the plywood. Switched out an expensive toilet we paid for for a cheap one. Discovered Heat runs covered with molding and or cabinetry. Had to call code enforcement to get a lightbulb put over the stairs descending to the basement in this half million dollar home. And this is just a sample. Recommendation : Do a daily pictorial with camera and back every verbal conversation with an email or fax to create a paper trail. Know how to read a blueprint. We caught this builder changing the window sizes and overhangs on the plan. Visits to the site and photographs Is the only way to prove who is telling the truth in a situation like this. I have the contract, the photographs and the emails/faxes to support my review for anyone thinking of using this builder. I CAN read a blueprint which is exactly WHY I was able to catch her in so many of her "unauthorized changes to our contract. I made it a point to communicate by fax and email so as to have a paper trail in case of problems. She can SAY anything but words on a paper and a time stamp don't lie.. I protected myself and I'm so glad I did . WE ....are the ones that found out this Builder totally installed the wrong roof on our house, and we halted construction immediately. Not only was it the wrong roof.... it didn't even look like the house we were paying to have built. We never changed the size, pitch hips or gables on our roof at any time before or after signing the contract. This story she claims about another plan being submitted, is a total fabricated lie. Her architect needed to redraw our submitted plan to get it approved by the Town and each drawing was a totally inaccurate redraw of the plan we submitted. What architect can NOT copy a house plan ? Why would he change the roof if we didn't make any changes to the roof ? Why would a hired architect make changes like this to someone's house plan without authorization and then repeatedly make the same mistake 3 or 4 times in a row. In each of his renderings the roof pitch was downsized, the overhangs were shortened and the windows changed in certain areas. These changes made by the builder and architect were flagrant as we had already agreed on a price for her to build the plan originally submitted. The only way there can be a "wrong set of blueprints submitted" was if the builder submitted a plan of her own and not the one we contracted to build. That is exactly what happened. I have the fax to prove that we discovered this problem and halted construction, not the builder. The basement was NOT dug according to our plan. The plan shows the living/family room steeped down and this builder forgot to have the mason accommodate the drop down change to the foundation which made the height of the basement too short to get the water out of the house without a PUMP. It is NOT a sump pump. It deals only with water from the two sinks and dishwasher on that side of the house. This was NOT IN OUR PLANS anywhere . This pump was installed to correct her mistake in the building of the basement. The plumber explained why it was needed and he said it was because the basement wasn't dug deep enough. It was the builders mistake. She also forgot to drop down the living room floor which is also in our plan, but refused to change it and or give us the credit due. She refused to give us credit for any change that resulted in a cost saving to her. Our contract clearly stated what kind of insulation was to be installed and again she changed it without even a conversation. The signed specifications were for batt insulation not blown in insulation. It's clearly stated in the contract which is why she had to bring someone in to remove it all and put the right insulation down. Yup ...it's in writing. She did nothing to accommodate us in the building of this home. Our hired home inspector found the the code violation in the beam in the basement and it was a major structural mistake. . I believe they drilled a hole in the eye beam to accommodate a pipe which compromised the structural integrity of the entire house. She needed to change it in order for this home to pass inspection. The town inspector agreed. As far as alienating her subcontractors ....we basically did not deal with them at all other than an occasion note left. Our visits were almost always after they were gone, in the evening. We communicated by fax with the builder about problems discovered at the end of each visit to the construction site. I think her sub contractors were weary of having to redo stuff because they followed her directions as opposed to the actual PLAN of the house. The exception to this would be the mason who we contracted for additional work on the home. We have enjoyed several dinners with him and his wife over the years. :) Before this contractor quoted a price to build this home we went over every addition, delation, and change to the plan. Included from the very start was ceiling fans in most of the rooms. This was an addition to the original plan. The builder knew there was a ceiling fan in the Laundry room from day one. She never said it wouldn't accommodate a ceiling fan or had a conversation with her Kitchen cabinet installers about the issue. This was her job !!!! What she failed to explain in her reply was WHY she allowed her electricians to install ceiling fan that hit the cupboard doors in the laundry room or why they installed a ceiling fan in the sitting room that was only 4 and a half feet off the ground. Yup ..they installed those fans and left them like that. She also knew the ceiling fan for the sitting room was from our old residence. We brought the box up to the house with this bicycle sprocket fan to be installed. This fan was originally in a cathedral ceiling and and therefore had a 24 inch extension arm on it. They installed it with the 24 inch extension arm on it. Maybe it was funny to her but the fan installed at 4 feet off the ground could have seriously injured a small child or animal if they turned it on. I was beginning to question some of the subcontractors she had working for her. Again ...I have the photos to prove this. The water poring in the French door ? Yes the house was under construction but the hardwood floors had already been installed and they were soaking wet. A properly installed door and window would not leak leak water onto a finished hardwood floor. The water running down the interior walls was due to the fact that she had not properly capped off the chimney. Her quick fix consisted of sticking a piece of plywood in the well at the top of the chimney which eventually rotted and we had to deal with water running down our interior wall again a couple years after moving in . This time the chimney was capped with the proper material that will not rot and expose us to this problem in the future. This is NOT the quality of construction one expects to find when building a home in the 500,000 dollar range. As far as the bill on this home....we paid every single cent we owed including money that we felt we didn't owe just to get rid of this woman . She refused to give us credits we had coming. She has refused all warranty work on this home but that was no surprise. We couldn't get her to show up most of the time when she was getting hefty draws from the bank . Like I said ....a promise of 6 months to build turned into an 16 month nightmare. She also changed the locks and tried to keep us out of our own home because she was tired of us correcting her mistakes and holding her to our agreed upon "contract." . We agreed on a blueprint and a price. What is there to not understand ? Had she told us upfront that she would make changes to this plan and build our home to HER liking ....we would have found another builder. Since this building nightmare ended, I have found my dentist, my husbands accountant, and a friends brother that also have had very negative experiences with this builder. Again....Knowing how to read a blueprint , having a camera, on hand, and communication by email or fax insures you have a better chance of getting what you pay for. It's sad that one needs to be so present when entrusting a job to someone else, but my experience just proves that you can get taken to the cleaners unless you are willing to stay on top of the situation and keep people honest. What I have in the way of photo's, contracts, and faxes speaks for itself. It's easy to come on here and attack someone's character but it all boils down to what's in writing. She can attack my character all she wants. We had a contract. She didn't abide by the contract and got caught. Nuff said.