YODER'S LANDSCAPING

Never performed worked walked away from job

Never got the work done. I started talking to him in the fall of 2016 about the project. I had a verbal commitment to start in the spring. I was instructed to get my existing deck removed then give him a call so he could get us a design. I removed it in April, as soon as the weather cooperated. He showed up in May to spray out the design. After several text messages back and forth discussing price and design, we settled on a design. He flaked on us several weeks later and decided that he didn't like our design and thought we were being too pushy. Apparently asking him twice when he was going to start, constitutes being pushy. Now it's June and we have a mud pit for patio, after I had thought we were set to have one in the spring. The text message way of communication that he practices is very unprofessional. I asked him to call me to discuss the issues he was referring to but he never did. The worst part is that we had other work done by him before and knew he wouldn't be punctual but were okay with it.

My neighbor uses Scott to get his lines blown out each year so I had it set up to have him service my lines at the same time. He knocked $5 off for the convenience. Unfortunately, I was on a conference call when the work was performed and realized that did not take my back flow preventer off to avoid freezing in the winter. Once I discovered this I contacted Scott. Scott eventually agreed to come over and take the backflow preventer off since I did not have the correct tool to do the job myself. I mistakenly thought he was going to do this a day or two after our conversation. I sent him a text and a picture of the backflow preventer still in place just as a friendly reminder. Scott texted me back and informed me that he never promised to have it removed so quickly, only that he would try. The text that he sent me was extremely rude, vulgar, and very unprofessional. After waiting a few more weeks with no response I eventually asked my neighbor if he had the proper wrench that I could borrow to remove it myself. I would never hire this company again due to their unprofessionalism.

We signed up with Scott to have our lawn, deck and irrigation system put in to the new house we built. Long story short, after three months of being strung along, he never did do the work. It was always "I'm going to start next week." But he never got around to doing anything. We did get a deck put up, but Yoders subcontracted that without telling us. If we would've known he was going to subcontract, we could've found our own deck guy. The deck was wrong -- not what we asked for -- so they had to come out and fix it. His secretary/wife is incredibly rude and difficult to work with. Finally in mid October, the weather was turning and we still had no lawn, we asked him if he could guarantee the plants since he had put us off for two months, and he refused, so we said forget it. Most unprofessional, worst company we have ever dealt with. Don't know how this guy stays in business.

After several promised start dates they finally show up. The excavation of the lot went pretty well. The employees were knowledgeable and friendly. The owner called and informed me that he could not remove the dirt from the lot at the original price quoted and it would cost me an additional $40 per load to remove dirt. I found some one on my own to take the dirt @ $30 per load. So it cost me $10 per load for the next 22 loads. After the excavation was done we waited several weeks to a month for them to return. The stone wall install went pretty well except the owner scraped dirt from the hill to fill behind the wall which made an already steep hill even steeper. I was supposed to receive 100 tons of topsoil. They delivered 3 truckloads (single axle dump) which my best estimate is at most 45 ton. They also took some of the topsoil back even after not putting topsoil in a common area that we had agreed would get topsoil. The topsoil contained lots of rocks. They rock hounded the topsoil and dumped the rocks on the adjacent empty lot beside mine. The lawn was then hydro seeded. The hill was also supposed to have been hydro seeded, but instead was covered with a straw blanket. OK I guess, just not what I paid for. The owner still claims the hill was hydro seeded. After some heavy rains lots of silt came off the hill in areas where there was no straw blanket. Also a lot of silt came out from behind the stone wall into the back yard. I think they should have used some landscape fabric behind the wall to keep the silt in. The owner called me about payment about three weeks after they finished. I told him that there were still some issues. Those being the silt accumulation, places on the hill lacking coverage, no topsoil in the common area and silt fence at the street that they removed to get access to my lot needed replaced. The owner stopped by on a Saturday an hour before dark to "look" at the job. He was supposed to be there that morning to correct the problems. He said he would be back tomorrow or sometime next week. He showed up the next friday again about an hour before dark and did a rush job to correct the problems. I was not home home when they finished, but when I did return later that night there were several messages on my answering machine stating that he was done and wanted his money. He even sent his wife to our residence to wait outside for our return in order to collect. We arrived home late but they had already left. The next morning I was awakened to the sound of the owner pounding on my back patio door. I guess the front door bell doesn't threaten like a good back door pounding. Anyway I went outside to inspect the previous nights work. Some of it was OK. But on one side of the hill they didn't use the straw blanket opting instead to just throw straw on it which was blowing away as we were talking. Also the silt fence at the street was not installed right allowing the silt to pass right under it. It was an obvious rush job. All the while the owner was yelling at me and making threats and telling me his home was getting foreclosed and it was my fault because I had not paid him. At the beginning of the project I asked how much $$ he wanted as down payment. His answer was none and I could pay when I was happy. I had even offered to pay for 90% of what we had agreed and pay the rest when they took care of the few details such as the silt fencing and he refused. This guy was obviously angry and unreasonable and using threats so I told him to leave my property. He would not leave and was pushing me and blocking me from entering my garage door. I finally got around him, went in the house and called the police. The police ordered him to leave my property. At this point I am convinced this guy has no intention of finishing this job correctly. The majority of the job is OK. It's just the promised but not delivered details that made this a bad experience, and the bad attitude of the owner. After viewing my invoice they had charged me tax @ 6.5 % when the rate is only 5.75% in my area. Also charged tax on the excavation portion which should be non tax. An email to the owner's wife corrected this "honest" mistake. I'm paying in full for a job not 100% finished correctly, because I figure it's cheaper and easier to fix these small items myself. And avoid the hassle of waiting and having them come here only to do it wrong again. The price wasn't bad. But if you're looking for a quality job done right and on time, look elsewhere.

Very happy with the result. They did tend to rush at times. I called them on it and they corrected their approach. Lighting and grading was their best. They also planted or moved about 30 trees. Irrigation was probably the most average. I'd use them for big jobs, hard-scapes and such. They do work very hard. You get your monies worth.

The original job was done well, they showed up on time and performed the work for the agreed price. However, the service on the system over the last few years has been awful. Getting them to come out on issues is very difficult. They may get back with you, but the followup time is atrocious. We have had misfiring sprinklers for the entire summer when i need the system the most. We have also asked them to look at other jobs on our property, were told they would follow up by a certain day and perform services, and then... nothing. Like I said, good people, they do nice work when you can actually get them to do it, but awful customer service, communication, and followup.

I CALLED AND GOT HIS WIFE ON THE PHONE AND SHE SAID MAYBE SHE PUT THE WRONG ZIP CODE ON IT. THIS WAS ON A FRIDAY, AND SHE SAID SHE WOULD FAX IT TO MY HUSBAND. WE DIDN'T GET THE FAX UNTIL MONDAY. THE WRITTEN ESTIMATE WAS FOR $3,600, WHICH WAS ABOUT 3 TIMES WHAT HE TOLD ME ON THE PHONE. I THEN TALKED TO HIS WIFE ON THE PHONE TO SET UP AN APPOINTMENT FOR HIM TO COME AND SHOW ME THE DRAWINGS. HE WAS SUPPOSED TO COME ON A SATURDAY AND I CONFIRMED THE APPOINTMENT TWO DAYS BEFORE AND SHE SAID WHEN I CONFIRMED THAT SHE MOVED IT FROM 9:30 AM TO 10AM. HE NEVER SHOWED UP THAT SATURDAY. I CALLED HIM ON MONDAY, HE TOLD ME THAT HE TRIED TO CALL ME MANY TIMES ON FRIDAY AND THERE WAS NO VOICE MAIL, AND THAT'S NOT TRUE. HE SAID HE WOULD CALL HIS WIFE RIGHT AWAY AND SEE IF HE COULD SET UP ANOTHER APPOINTMENT AND HE WOULD CALL ME RIGHT BACK AND HE'S NEVER CALLED BACK. VERY STRANGE AND UNPROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE. I'M TOTALLY DISAPPOINTED. I'VE BEEN WORKING ON THIS FOR A LONG TIME AND HAVE NOTHING.

I COULDN'T BE HAPPIER. THEY SEEDED THE LAWN ON 7-29 AND IT WAS LUSH AND FULL LESS THAN 3 WEEKS LATER. I'VE ALREADY HAD TO MOW TWICE! EXCEPTIONALLY GOOD ABOUT RETURNING PHONE CALLS AND KEEPING US UP TO DATE ON SCHEDULING. AS THIS IS A NEW DEVELOPMENT, I'VE HAD THE OPPORTUNITY TO COMPARE THEIR WORK AGAINST MANY OTHERS AND I FEEL THAT THEY HAVE DONE AN OUTSTANDING JOB WITH MY LAWN. VERY FEW BARE PATCHES WHICH IS SURPRISING CONSIDERING THE TIME OF YEAR THAT IT WAS PUT IN. MY ONLY REGRET IS THAT WE DIDN'T QUITE HAVE THE FUNDS TO DO ANY ORNAMENTAL PLANTING THIS YEAR. I WOULD HIGHLY RECOMMEND.