Mountain Builders

Initially, I was impressed with the progress. Everything was faster than I expected. Then, after about 3 months, in January of 2009, another contractor and friend visited the house and told me he saw several things not up to building code standards. I questioned the builder, Larry Bovenzi, Mountain Builders about them and he denied that there were any problems or brushed them off as very minor and east to fix. I asked specifically how he intended to fix them andd he could not tell me. He then wanted a payment. I had already paid him nearly 2/3 of the entire contract, but I thought the home was only about 25% complete. He tried to CLAIM teh home was over 70% complete. He would not proceed any further withhout more money, wanting another 25% and saying he would not complete the home until he was paid in full. I fired him and started searching for another contractor. As it turned out, I had to hire a structural engineer and an architect first, just to propose how to fix the mistakes made by Mountain Builders. The entire deck and all supports had to be removed as they did not meet code. The foundation footers did not meet code and had to be pulled out and replaced - blue prints called for them to be 52" x 52" x12" deep...Mr. Bovenzi made them 46" x46" x 8" deep. He also used support poles rated at 21,000 lbs when the blueprints called for ples rated at 45,000 lbs! Consider too, that I was paying for all materials separately and he would just order them, so it cost him NO more money to do the job correctly, it only saved him time not too. There were also countless leaks and other code violations. He had claimed the building inspector said everything was fine and was there 8 times. I found out from the townisip later tht the inspector was only at the site TWICE, in the very early foundation stages, and that is when Bovenzi had contracted the foundation ICF forms to a subcontractor. What was inspected, was the other sub's work. In all, after the new contractors got involved and after the structural engineer and architect gave a report, the house now cost an ADDITIONAL $175,000 to complete! I fire