CREATIVE HOMES

Description of Work: My husband and I initially contacted Creative Homes to construct a house for our family based on the good reviews that we had heard about the company. I am sorry to say that our overall experience with the company was anything but positive, and I am submitting this sincere complaint to inform potential home buyers about the level of unprofessionalism and lack of integrity my family witnessed from the employees subcontracted to work in the name of Creative Homes. On Saturday, June 4th, 2011, my husband and I inspected the site of our future property and were shocked to find several empty Bud Light beer cans littering the grounds. We documented the unpleasant incident by taking photographs and decided to discuss what we found with an employee from Creative Homes because such unprofessional behavior should be properly addressed and resolved. On Sunday, June 5th, 2011, my father-in-law, who has professional knowledge of various construction processes, made his daily round to the site in order to examine the ongoing production and discovered that the frame of the house had been put up in an improper way. A significant amount of the frame was hanging off of the foundation, and it was not at all level with the measurements of the cement. My husband and I immediately traveled to the location and began to document the inaccuracies with video tape and photographs. We were flabbergasted that such a visible error had not been detected by the members of the framing crew – we could only assume at the time that the workers did not care about the obvious mistake. Instead of stopping production to investigate the matter thoroughly, the framing crew continued to build. My husband promptly left a message on Roland Herrera’s, the construction supervisor, voicemail. Now, my husband and I are not construction experts, but we do know several people who are professionally licensed in the field. We consulted with one on Sunday evening and asked this person to examine the photographs and videos that we had taken of the site. I would like to make it clear that the person that we contacted is not a family member or friend, but a business acquaintance. This person confirmed that several errors could indeed be spotted in our documentation of the construction process. With our worries having been verified, my husband and I decided that it was time to contact an authoritative figure in Creative Homes. On Monday, June 6th, 2011, my husband and his father traveled to Creative Homes Headquarters and requested to speak with one of the owners, Joe Swan, directly as he oversees the construction process. They were informed that he was away on vacation and would be unable to meet with them until he returned. My husband left his cell phone number with the secretary, along with a message stating that he had an urgent matter to discuss with Mr. Swan. He was never contacted. After leaving the Creative Homes Headquarters’s office, they traveled to the property site and spoke with Roland Herrera, who was witnessed by more than one person speaking to Mr. Swan via cell phone on site. It’s rather curious that Mr. Swan found time to speak with him, but not return a paying customer’s phone call – at least to inform the customer that he was having the matter attended to. However, I digress. Regarding the construction blunder, Mr. Herrera decided that the frame needed to be adjusted so that it would sit properly on the foundation. Upon closer inspection of the cement measurements, it was discovered that the foundation had been shorted two inches in more than one area. In essence, the frame workers were trying to shove a rectangle peg in a square shaped hole and not one single employee spoke out about the visible disproportion. This is beyond unacceptable; more so because the cement crew had previously been informed about visible unevenness. My father-in-law had previously discussed several flaws that he had visibly noticed with the cement workers. The leader of this particular construction team assured him that things would be fixed after the inspector had cleared the foundation process. This was obviously a falsehood, or more than one person simply failed to perform his or her job correctly. Furthermore, the leader of the foundation crew solidified the unprofessionalism of his team by presenting an apathetic attitude after being summoned to the property site by Mr. Herrera. Not one word of apology was offered by this man for the blunder of his crew. In fact, the man appeared to be more annoyed than remorseful when he stated that he would add in the missing cement and reinforce the foundation with rebar wire. My husband and I are appalled that Mr. Herrera would entrust the repair of the foundation to the same crew who proved to be unreliable. How is my family supposed to trust these workers to make the necessary repairs after they have proven to be incompetent, in addition to being supposed alcoholics who can’t wait to leave a building site before they start drinking? While we cannot prove that the workers did drink while they worked, the crew also cannot prove that they did not drink on the job. I’m rather curious if this particular crew have worked on other houses. If so, I wonder what the owners of those houses would think if they learned about the beer can incident my husband and I experienced. As of 8:00 p.m. on Tuesday June, 8th, 2011, the cement crew had not made the necessary repairs to the foundation, and the framing crew members continued to build on the site earlier in the day. This is alarming. IF the repairs were somehow made in the early hours, there should have been no building done the rest of the day because we were informed that the repairs to the cement would take three days to dry completely. Why would the workers continue to build on wet cement? On Monday, June 13th, my husband and I finally managed to speak directly with Mr. Swan, who had at last found some free time to speak with a customer after spending his time showcasing his company in the 2011 Parade of Homes weekend affair. I had prepared an event outline for Mr. Swan regarding the construction process, and I also included photographs. This offering was immediately ignored and pushed aside, and during the short fifteen minute meeting Mr. Swan defended his company and acknowledged that a mistake had been committed. He promised to fix what had gone wrong, but not once did he bring up the fact that subcontracted employees may have been drinking on the job. Therefore, I brought it up and demanded to know what he thought of the beer can incident. Mr. Swan pretended to not know what I was speaking of, and asked Mr. Herrera about what I was referring to. Of course, the beer cans could not be traced to one single crew because each team swore that their members did not drink. Pretty convenient. I am both amused and frustrated that my husband and I were expected to take such declarations seriously, especially when we have photographs that prove otherwise. Also, we came to find out during the meeting that the frame of our house was supposedly not adjusted to fit the foundation, or so Mr. Herrera claims. This situation is somewhat complicated to explain, mostly because there are witnesses that heard Mr. Herrera state that the frame needed to be moved and that it WAS going to be adjusted. However, in the meeting Mr. Herrera claimed that he gave my husband a choice between having the frame moved or having the cement repaired, not both. Therefore, according to Mr. Herrera, the frame of the house was NOT adjusted to the inaccurate foundation measurements since my husband decided that the foundation needed to be repaired. This is interesting, because obviously it was moved. No one ever witnessed the return of the cement crew to the site during daily visitations – three times a day I might add. However, in the pictures it can clearly be seen that on the 7th of June the frame was not hanging off of the foundation as much as it had been prior to our complaint. There was also an issue regarding the roof of our house. My husband and I had asked for the vent to the stove to go through the roof, but the roof was constructed and finished without this particular addition, which we were obligated to pay extra for, being put in. Mr. Swan stated that such work could be corrected without any problem, and continued by claiming that the roofers must have gotten ahead of the plans. There is obviously no communication going on in the company between the subcontracted employees. Mr. Swan also stated that the roof was completed because the company was concerned about the chance of rain. This is hogwash. Our area has not received any large amount of precipitation in months. Moreover, there are plenty of other houses in production, and the roofs of those houses all had necessary, standard holes carved in prior to being finished. Large plastic canvases covered these holes, and because of this fact, my husband and I are not buying the rain excuse.