Image Homes Inc

We hired Carl Owens (Image Homes) who was recommended by our architect. He seemed competent and reasonable. He took us through several houses he had completed and all looked well built. I guess we should have realized that we never did talk to any of the homeowners. Our first mistake. We hired him to build our 7,000 square foot home on the marsh in 2010 as a fee based contractor. We were assured that no additional fees would ever be accrued even with change orders. Too bad for us that we never got that in writing. Our second mistake. Construction began on January 2, 2012. From the day we began construction we felt Mr. Owens was working for himself and his subcontractors, not us. He was competent at telling us what we couldn't do as opposed to what we could. He wanted the home of HIS dreams...not OURS. He was unprofessional, often yelling at subs, and vendors and eventually even screaming at us. His budget was an absolute joke?underbidding at every opportunity. The last budget was substantially over his original and we had omitted a whole out building! So slicing the budget to meet our numbers was a necessity, but never giving us the specifics was our third mistake. And a very costly one. Mr. Owens was never transparent with his finances, on the contrary, we asked over and over again to see the bills and he had one excuse after another as to how he couldn't be bothered with that. The first change order that was made had a builders fee of about $1500.00 added. My husband questioned him on this and Mr. Owens wove a tale of higher insurance costs and liability because of this change-a tall tale to be sure. Eventually, and because we felt like he was hiding something, we had to hire a lawyer whose construction litigation background helped us to determine our rights. He tried to get the invoices out of Mr. Owens and did not succeed. Eventually we stopped all further draws from the bank in hopes of getting Mr. Owen's attention to the seriousness of our needs. That obviously worked because he showed up to our door unannounced the very next day with a large binder in his hands filled with invoices he threw on our counter?flaunting it in our faces? yet insisted he couldn't give us. He refused to even let us make copies, stating "that his attorney and accountant told him not to." Finally he said that his accountant was willing to make copies of all of the invoices for $200.00 per hour. It would cost us over $1,000 dollars to see our own invoices! Money was not to only thing that put us off to Mr. Owens and Image Homes. Our substantial project didn't not warrant a full-time project manager in Mr. Owen's eyes. He consistently fought with our PM about not spending so much time at our site. "The subs knew what they were doing and the project could run itself"! Can you imagine that a GC would say such a thing? What kind of quality control is that? And the times he would actually call the ARB about a particular design element that we wanted, but he didn't, so he would get the ARB to tell us no instead? Outrageous! And the little white lies?telling my husband I had chosen doors way over budget when I never did. Trying to vie us against one-another. Saying that we gave the okay the things when we never did. Questioning our own sanity at times. The constant bulling tactics and refusal to work for us instead of against us made for a very difficult working relationship to say the least. But it all came to a head in July when the Invoices were dangled in our faces. After bullying my husband into agreeing to the outrageous sum to have copies of the invoices made, I finally put my foot down. Why was our contractor working against us? Why was he hiding our finances? Why was this such a fight? Did we want this guy working for us? We gave serious consideration to firing him. But before we could make a move to do so, and the very next day, I went to the site to find it vacant. All subs gone and the site left open and abandoned. That was the last straw. This final act of trying to bully us into seeing our project as his was finally over and Carl Owens and Image Homes will never work on another project of ours again. After it all, and spending that much more, we had come to find out that there are serious flaws in the construction and quality of the work that he had completed. All of the windows and doors need to be removed and re-installed. The stucco was improperly designed installed and water is penetrating the walls. Now this needs removal and re-installation. Wrong nails were used and are already rusting, floors are humped and need fixing, The roof is leaking! In a final act of betrayal, Mr. Owens has the unmitigated gall to keep materials and equipment that has been paid for, in his own possession and refuses to give them up. As well as, slapping a lean against us, which is nothing but extortion. But after the nightmares, lost money, and angst, my husband and I can finally sleep again after knowing that Carl Owens and Images Homes will NEVER step foot on our property again.