Absolute Home Solutions

At first things were great. He was extremely responsive and helpful. He went above and beyond. As the summer went on he kept getting more jobs and started to not show up for our jobs. He sent other people to complete the jobs. This worked out well until he had to fire that employee. After that it was like pulling teeth to get him to our house to finish the jobs. We would set up a time and he wouldn't show up. He would either call long after the appointment time saying he wasn't going to show or he wouldn't even call and we would have to call him to figure out why he never showed. The last job we had him do was install some crown molding. After setting up 3 appointments he finally showed up to finish the job. It was terrible. The molding is not flush to the walls nor to the top of the cabinet. The seams also do not match. He used glue and painters tape in an attempt to make the seams come together. When we removed the painters tape the seams came apart and it looks terrible. It was always important to him that we liked his work. He would always ask us if things looked alright and always offered to change it if we didn't like it. He also always said he would makes things right. We had to have him do a couple of things over and he was more than happy to make things right. But after a second try with the crown molding and 3 missed appointments we just wanted our money back. He said he would be able to arrange that. A month went by of us trying to get a hold of him for the refund and he finally answered us back with some news that he had a family emergency. This was Sept 2013. He said he would call us back when he got into town and never did. I contacted him again in Dec. and he finally responded saying he would put the check in the mail as soon as possible because he just got back into town. It is now almost Feb. 2014 and he is no longer returning our calls or messages. We assume now we will no longer be getting our refund back and will have to eat the loss of the crown molding and the loss of having to buy new crown molding to replace what he put up. Overall, terrible experience.

We called Greg on Monday, January 13th, and asked if he could give us an estimate. He said he would be by on Wednesday between 3:30 and 4:00 but failed to show up. I called and his wife apologized for forgetting us, but assured us he would be here on Thursday by 4:30. Greg called approximately 4:15 on Thursday, and said he was busy but would be here for sure Friday between 12:00 and 12:300. He did not come by, he did not call, and we have not heard from him since. Very Disappointing.

Built a new front porch (deck) over a sagging concrete slab.

Two guys from Absolute Home Solutions stopped by last week. I took them to our garage and discussed what we wanted a quote for (tacking up the insulation under the roof, then close in the dead space between it and the floor). They didn't take any measurements nor did they mention what the job might cost or how long it would take! They said it would be a quick and easy job--and that all that information/details would be in the Estimate, which we'd receive in 1-2 days! I had to ask for a business card; they didn't offer one! | |We received the Estimate in the mail yesterday (11/18), and the only "Detail" on the page was the cost: $1,400.00! No breakdown of costs for materials, supplies, labor, or approximately time frame for the job! That shocked us! | |I plan to call them and request the cost breakdown that we were promised--because their estimate is twice what we'd expected it to be! Meanwhile, we plan to get an estimate from another local contractor. | |

Greg's estimate was very fair and thourough (we have a contractor friend out of state who looked at it). He had good suggestions for where to purchase the materials, and especially the suggestion for laying the tile in the bathroom on the diagonal rather than the ususal straight rows. Greg and his helper would arrive within 30 minutes of the time he said he would be here which we appreciated, and they were courteous and worked hard while here. Greg did the tile flooring while several of his other employees did the wood flooring. The bathroom floor looks beautiful, as does the wood flooring. Greg will tell you that he doesn't get paid in full until the customer is happy with the work...he is true to his word. To us that was very important as we have (as many have) heard horror stories about paying in full and then the work isn't finished. My husband lives with a serious lung disease so this whole project was very h****** him and his lungs. Greg and the crew did everything they could to keep dust levels and noise levels down which helped my husband tremendously. It's not easy with noise levels when you have compressers running and saws going...they did the best they could in that regard. The clean up of the area when they finished was good too. Greg also has a cleaning person that comes in to help out after everything is done - we didn't need her but it is a nice little perk. The only negative I would have to comment on is the finish details. Greg needs to be more proactive in that regard rather than waiting to see what the homeowner finds in errors. We'd really rather not find them! His helper for the tiling is new to the business so is just learning - which is fine, but he made several glaring errors which we had to eventually point out to Greg. These are things that Greg should have picked up on right away and corrected. It all did get corrected to our satisfaction though. Overall we are extremely happy with the finished product. We appreciate all the hard work that went into it, the good crew of guys that Greg employs, and Greg's being true to his promise of no final payment until we're satisfied. Thanks Greg! :0) UPDATE ON REVIEW 12/16/2013: It is with regret that we are posting this update. When we paid Greg the final payment on the job, he said that if we found something that concerned us to contact him. It took a few days of everything settling in to initially notice several finishing problems with a newly installed closet door and, in particular, the new stair flooring. We called Greg and after he looked at and acknowledged the problems, he sent one of his employees to do the detailing/finish work. The door was fixed, but the stair work finishing, which should have been an easy job (cleaning paint spots on the wood, filling in nail holes, and cleaning up the edges), ended up looking worse. The young employee, who had worked very hard, did not have the knowledge/experience to do the finish work. We contacted Greg and he stopped by the house. He agreed with our assessment of the situation and promised he would personally take care of it. Greg estimated it would take him about two hours to clean-up everything and offered to do the finish work on November 27th. On November 27th, he arrived at the house, but only to advise he could not do the work as he had forgotten he had to leave that morning for a few days. He said he would be back that Saturday after Thanksgiving to finish up the job. We fully understood given that it was a holiday and agreed that Saturday was fine. Greg contacted us on Saturday (Nov. 30th) and said he wasn't going to be able to get here but he would be here the next morning (Dec. 1st). We said OK, but we then had an email from him on Sunday morning asking if he could come by that afternoon rather than in the morning as he had another job to finish up. We again said OK. We heard nothing after that. On Dec. 6th my husband again contacted Greg via email inquiring as to what happened. Greg responded on the 7th with a heartfelt apology, said he completely forgot (we knew he had been very busy and working every day for weeks), and that he would call us sometime during that day. Again we have heard nothing since. This disappoints us greatly, as we believed what Greg had said: ?If you are not happy with the work then I?m not going to be happy?. We completely understand that Greg has absolutely no legal obligation to us to fix the errors on the stairs - especially since we had paid him. We are, however, disappointed with the manner Greg has responded to us since November 27th, and how this has ended. We are in the process of hiring someone else to clean-up the stairs. If there was a button on the choices above that said "Not Sure" to the question "Would you use this provider in the future?" - we would choose the "not sure"...

Demolished entire bathroom and kitchen. Opened a doorway into 8' span to create open concept kitchen/livingroom. Re-built bathroom from studs out, including plumbing, new tile floor, new window, new walls, new sheetrock finish, paint, electrical, tub/shower tile-surround, new vanity/sink. In kitchen built new enclosure and brought water for refrigerator, stripped, sanded, painted old cabinetry, stone/glass tile/stainless backsplash, tiled new countertop, installed granite sink, hooked up all new appliances, including garbage disposal, dishwasher, faucet, refrigerator, stove, oven, etc. Built new multi-purpose room in an old storage area at back of house. Replaced and trimmed out back exterior door. Completed new flooring throughout the home. Intsalled 6" baseboard throughout the house. Installed rececessed lighting and some track lighting. Greg Hanrahan, his wife, and his crew were the perfectly selected contractors for us to work with. We are a husband/wife team who have done a lot of construction and remodeling ourselves in the past and we wanted to find a contractor who would take the time to work hand-in-hand with us, allowing us to make decisions and changes along the way. This was hard to find. We called for four bids and only Absolute Solutions came back with a bid. We believe that others did not bid because we wanted to provide most of the materials and that is a difficult situation for a contractor to work with. Because we had experience with this type of work, the two of us had calculated what we thought (individually) the bid should be. When we received Greg's bid, we had to laugh because he was within a couple of hundred dollars on a large project to that we had estimated to be fair for the labor we were requesting. While working with us, Greg asked nearly every day if we were happy with the work or if there were any problems. When small things popped up (as we would expect in such a large undertaking), we would simply tell Greg and he responded with the Nordstrom approach (the customer is always right attitude) and took care of the minor concerns. We have never worked with a contractor who did not roll their eyes or say their way was better (even though sometimes it probably is), but whose main purpose was to do the job the way we wanted it done. This relationship was a joy! In the middle of the job we decided to remodel the back room because it would be the only room not refinished in the house. We gave Greg the scope of the request and within a day he gave us what it would cost for the add-on. We realize this extended his time at this job, which is h****** a contractor, but he completed the extra work with a smile and again, a fair price. Greg allowed us to pick and buy our supplies. We did not do this to take money out of his pocket, but because we wanted to shop and make our own idiosyncratic decisions on decor. He never complained if we bought the wrong type of merchandise; he just explained and sent us to get the right thing, or in some cases, picked the item up himself to speed the process and then gave us the receipt to reimburse him. Again, this was done with a smile. If he was annoyed, he kept his professional face on and just completed the work. One example was when he installed the new kitchen faucet. It came with a faceplate in the box. I did not want that installed, and when he showed me the installed product, I wasn't 100% sold on how it looked, but didn't realize it was because the plate was on. When I went home that night, it hit me what was "off". I sent him an e-mail immediately to try to reach him before the waterlines were connected, etc. and told him I did not want the plate installed. Without a word of complaint, he removed it the next morning. These kinds of little things happened throughout the process. Because he allowed us to be so hands-on, we saw small things that probably drove him crazy, but he smiled and altered them to create the remodel job we wanted. Greg was also VERY easy to communicate with. We could e-mail him and he responded within an hour. We could call him on his cell phone and he answered every time. This is highly unusual in the world of contractors. It is normally very difficult to make contact with your contractor directly. What we also enjoyed about our working relationship was that Greg, himself, did the work and was on the jobsite every single day! Even in he had his superb electrician Glenn working with him, Greg was present. When he had helpers (Mike and Ty) laying the laminate, he was there. He had a hand in every part of the job. He knows structure, framing, sheetrocking, tiling, etc., etc. This is unusual and much, much appreciated. So many companies use subs and then do not take full responsibility for the work of the subs. Greg owns the company, is the boss, and gives constant direction and takes responsibility for his crew's work. He never made excuses, he made fixes. As we finished the job, we could see the pride on Greg's face of a job well-done--he actually cared! When we gave him the "pin" list of little things to accomplish before he left, he just took the list (again with a smile) and attacked the little list. He finished them before he expected to be paid. In the end, we had a 10% coupon from Angie's list, but did not ask for the discount because the service rendered was exactly what we had asked for and the original bid was exactly what we felt the work was worth. We have forged an excellent client/contractor relationship and if Greg will have us, we will be using him on our next big project. A side note: We hired Absolute to perform this job because we wanted to sell a home we had used as a rental since 1997. The work would have taken us about six months if we tried to do it ourselves. We wanted it to be sold quickly. Our goal was to make it outshine all the other ranch homes in Richland of equal size and rooms. We listed it ourselves on Craigslist and the first person who looked at it has entered into a contract with us to purchase. We have others calling us back asking if it is still available. We have Greg and his willingness to work with us on our terms to thank for our success.

I called two days ago and left all my information on an answering machine and still have not received a call back. I called the office again today and again no answer, just a machine.

No service was performed. There is no business.

Greg did an excellent job start to finish. Did have some water damage in 2 rooms because we had unexpected rain during the roofing install. Greg did the right thing when he made the repairs & did an excellent job.

We will write explaining the scope of the work and how it all played out when Greg is finished with the work.

He said 4 days. I had to take 2 weeks off of work and it still wasn?t done. A couple of days, they only came by for 45 minutes and said they ?might come back in the afternoon.? The one day, a worker was sitting around for about 2 hours before his supplies arrived. After 3 weeks, Greg realized he hadn?t ordered enough flooring. To his credit, I am satisfied with the ceiling. They removed the popcorn, textured, and painted. Texturing was the only thing Greg did himself. The first day, while I was out, Greg decided he wasn?t going to remove the wallpaper or the old flooring, as specified in the contract. It took 6 days to convince him to remove the old vinyl all the way to the cement. He kept telling me, ?I don?t have to.? Which to me meant, ?I know I can get away with taking shortcuts.? I had to point out to Greg that he bought the wrong primer and I later found out he also bought the wrong adhesive for the flooring. Instead of removing the light fixture from the ceiling, they left it dangling by the wires (for weeks). So it got splattered with texturing and/or paint. I thought I was hiring professionals. One of the guys told he he?d never done this before. Ripping the trim off the doorways, the guy ripped the paint and wall. At times they failed to bring the proper equipment for the job and ended up using my tools, including leather gloves, and a paint roller (I didn?t know about it until I found it in the trash). The bottom portion of my shower curtain is now the color of the wall downstairs. The final straw was the baseboards. Greg stained them and he hadn?t mentioned any problems. He dropped them off, saying ?I put 2 coats of stain on them.? They looked awful. They were all splotchy. Several had black marks; two had green on the top edge. And no finish had been applied. I had to start over with new wood and had it stained elsewhere. Other contractors told me that because the damage around the doors, the wall would need to be sanded, mudded and textured for several inches all the way around the doors and may never look quite right. I had to replace with the trim with something wider to cover the damage.

It was a big job, perhaps too large for this company. They painted by using a spray paint method. In order to do this, they took down everything like window treatments including the hardware, bathroom wall fixtures and neglected to put everything back. They did fill in all holes in the walls, and some were very deep, The linoleum was left with a split in a small area in the kitchen.The carpeting was done excellent. They were very sloppy as they left my items, and theirs all over the house, inside on the floor and outside on the ground. They needed paint to "touch-up" the places they left marks on and I had to pay for it. One of the painters was nice enough to tighten a kitchen pipe that was leaking. I don't believe he told Mr. Hanrahan or I would have been charged. The extra items I have been charged for I was told would be sent to me by email and I am still waiting. There was never a contract showing his work is guaranteed for any lenght of time. I had a coupon from Angie's list that he did not honor.

The job went without a hitch and Greg was professional his his work and dealings with the tenant and me.

Our experience with Absolute Home Solutions has been fabulous. I set up all the meetings without my husband because he was working long hours. Therefore, Greg interacted mainly with me. I did not feel uncomfortable at all and he was always willing to answer any questions I had. Other contractors I had come through made me feel as though they were taking advantage of me. Because I was making most of the decisions at this point, Greg's honesty went a long way in my book. I highly recommend Greg to any single mom or women in need of a trustworthy contractor that will not rip you off just because you are a woman! Greg happily answered questions unrelated to the work he was doing in our home. He always asked how I liked the work. In addition, even though my husband was usually not around when Greg was there, he asked how my husband felt about the work too. He explained everything he would be doing and was incredibly knowledgeable about his work. At first our list of things for him to do was short. As we continued with renovations the list became longer. Greg was happy to work with us on the additional work which was great. He was super flexible. In addition, he always tidied up at the end of the day which was wonderful. The prices were very reasonable. I had looked at other contractors for the electrical in the soffit and they were outrageous. Greg did the electrical and soffit repair in the same price quoted as the electrical alone from another contractor.

We contacted Greg from Absolute Home Solutions in April to give us a estimate on removing the large jetted tub that was unpractical for us to use. and replaced it with a large shower with tiled floor and tiled walls to the ceiling. He installed a fan with a heated light and a tiled bench . Framed in two areas about 4 " deep and 12" wide to keep shower soap and etc. Framed up the shower and installed a very attractive matching shower door. The shower is 4 FT wide and ft 6" long.. We changed the floor tile and moved the toilet into the area where the small shower had been. We installed a darker brown tile in the shower and chose a lighter brown on the floor. When Greg installed the tile he gave it a special look and not just the old traditional way. Looks Great!!!. Very pleased with complete job. Greg always made sure that we were pleased with the job as it was moving forward. If for any reason he would get held up on another job he would call and keep us informed of any changes and how it fit with our timeline. We have a beautiful new bathroom that we are very pleased with.

Josh and his partner did an excellent job,. Working with only an lunch break this job took 2 days. They even worked in the rain, so the job was finished on time. We could not have asked for a better job and are completely satisfied. Would definately use them again.

Greg made a very good first impression with a detailed summary of the work description and itemized cost of labor and material in his estimate. On a scale of 1 to 10, it was a 10 compared to the one page estimate by Mr. Orthman of Alpha Building who presented just a simple list of what he would do and total cost on a single sheet. Mr. Hanrahan?s cost was half what Mr.Orthman proposed in his estimate, which was close to $10,000. Greg is very flexible and easy to work with. Our first obstacle came when I discovered the City of West Richland requires a permit for all decks, even ones that are under 18 inches. Mr. Orthman had told me when he came to do his estimate that a permit is not required on decks under 18 inches high. A week before the work was scheduled, I drew up a simple plan, like the ones the city had required when we put in a shed and a split rail fence, and went down to the Planning Department. To my surprise, they required a permit, unlike all the other cities around us, and they required the contractor to draw the specifications. When I told Greg he was not the least troubled and said he knew exactly what they wanted. We met at the Planning Department and Greg submitted everything and learned he had to have a City License for the City of West Richland in order to perform work here, even though he has a State License. He was told he had to get it on the Internet. No matter what came up, Greg handled it in a professional and enthusiastic way. Even when I was irritated at some of the hoops we were made to jump through for a deck that is almost right on the ground, Greg retained his positive attitude. Finally work began. The inspector wanted to look at the holes before they were filled. When he came to inspect, he wanted the 24 inch deep holes to be even sided all the way down and flat on the bottom. Greg said, ?No problem, I?ll be there at 7:00 in the morning to even out the bottoms.? The inspector came back and signed off on the holes and then they were filled and the posts sunk. They had to dry 48 hours before the frame could be done, and the inspector wanted to see the framing before the deck was put on. He signed off on the frame and within two days of that, the deck was done. It is impeccable in strength and construction, and it is also beautiful. Greg really knows his stuff. Because I am a cautious person who knows seniors are sometimes taken advantage of, I checked with the BBB for possible complaints and there was one. While reading Greg?s response to the complaint, it was clear to me that he really knew what he was talking about, and that he was making every attempt to satisfy his customer. Greg has been in this line of work for many years and to only have one complaint is commendable, and to have a good resolution speaks well of him and his work ethic. During the final process Greg discovered he had miscalculated the cost of materials by $800 but he did not let us make that up to him because he said it was his mistake. My husband said that didn?t seem fair that he should have to eat $800 but Greg insisted he would not take extra money for it. He said he stands by his mistakes. So we gave him a "bonus" of $400 and we still came out way ahead on the other estimate. We are so happy and impressed with the work ethic of Greg Hanrahan that we are going to have him replace a run-down 6 foot fence across the backyard.

It went very well. If there was anything we didn't like they returned promptly to fix it. They were very friendly and hard working. We were very pleased with thier work.

I had Roberts Const. supposedly flash and take care of water damage on my front stoop. They charged me an exorbitant amount and did't fix the problem. Greg repaired the damage and used the proper material to ensure the problem is resolved. The whole experience was good from start to finish. If I have one very minor quible it's I think Greg should get one of those magnetic sweeps to pickup the excess nails and screws that just happen when you're doing this kind of work. I will definetly keep Absolute on my short list for future work.

We called Greg and told him we had a small job, but we were in a hurry. it was a safety-related remodel of the head of a stairwell, where my 93-year-old father-in-law had fallen down the stairs, and was badly hurt. We needed a railing and gate put in so that he could not fall there again. Greg was very prompt with an estimate, and said he could do the job quickly. The next day he said he had to wait for the gate to be delivered -- a day or two. A couple days later we got a different story from him. The following week he stopped returning my phone calls or answering voice mail. I had to find another contractor to do the job, which he did in 1 day. I sent Greg an email saying we had found someone else to do the job. We never did hear from him.

Greg came out to give me an estimate to repair a poorly installed attic ladder. He gave me a rough estimate based on what we believed the job would take. Due to my time limitations, Greg and Josh came out on a Sunday to complete the work. They did an absolutely awesome job repairing the attic ladder and the actual cost was lower than expected. They also placed moulding around the ladder to give it a more finished look. I can't say enough for their attention to detail. I would highly recommend them for any work they advertise. Thanks again!!

Greg and Josh were always punctual , profressional, helpful and accomodating. From the initial visit to give a written estimate, to the first day of work until the last I felt very comfortable with their attitude, expertise, and work ethic. They were on the job the entire time and stuck with it until it was finished. They accomodated me when I requested some additional scope to be done and kept me in the loop with everything as it happened to make sure I was satisfied with their work. They were creative with solutions to the usual issues that arise on remodel projects and they even hired a professional cleaning company to come and clean up after the work was complete (whom also did an excellent job) at their cost. My wife was very happy with how tidy the place was after the work was completed. I can't recommend Absolute Home solutions enough and will definitely go to them in the future for my next project.

When my husband first talked to AHS is was thought that the faucet and valves needed to be replaced so the estimate reflected that. When Josh came and got into the repair, he noticed that the valves were just fine and did not need to be replaced. He told us what he found and said it is only the faucet that needs to be replaced so he replaced it and adjusted the final cost to reflect actual work that was done which was less. We appreciated the honesty of only charging us for what he actually did. We have other projects that we are going to need to be done so we will be using AHS again.

Overall it was a productive meeting that left me with goals I could meet at a later date.

We found Absolute Home Solutions on Angies list along with 2 other companies and accepted Greg's bid over the other 2. There was nothing wrong with the other companies we just had to make a decision and Greg's bid was broke down step by step and item by item which impressed my husband. The other 2 bids were just general. Greg started demo the next monday which was the 5th of November. We had a few slow downs one being mold behind the old shower wall and we the home owners did not have all items ordered so we had to wait for delivery. To give Greg an idea of the tile layout we wanted we laid a sheet on the livingroom floor and made a abstract design for Greg, lucky him. It was quite the challenging design trying to fit together 6x6, 9x12, 12x12 and 18x18 sizes. Greg said he wanted to take on the challenge and the bathroom turned out beautiful. The 6x6 tiles turned out to be irregular which we found out half way thru the install. Greg had to use some other sizes to make 6x6. There were some personal things Greg had to take care of but he let us know ahead of time so we were not sitting and waiting. At one point Greg felt he was taking to long with the project about halfway thru and asked if it was okay with us for him to work Saturday and Sunday that week. There have been no other contractors we have worked with that are willing to make up work on the weekend. Greg and his sidekick Josh are people we have no problem recommending. We did have a problem with one of the floor tiles and Greg came over as soon as time was available and took care of it. Now all is good. We now have a great, fantastic, beautiful bathroom. Thanks Greg and Josh