A&R PAINTING

The color consultant was Roy's wife, who had a box of paint chips and seemingly little expertise or much else to enable to provide color consultation. However, she made an attempt to help. Once the colors were selected, and after many many calls to get the paint project under way, they could not find a suitable time in their schedule to paint my house. Then October came and the rains started. Roy assured me that painting in the shoulder months was okay, the paint would be fine. I preferred to wait until we weren't in the throes of winter rains, wait until spring. As spring arrived, I noticed the blisters on my neighbors house and inquired. They said they could not get A&R to come back to repair the paint, after many calls. I got nervous, reviewed my contract, saw that there was a clause stating that if the project were not completed within six months, I could cancel the contract. I called and emailed, letting Aaron and Roy know I wanted to cancel the contract and get my deposit back. Roy's wife called me back and told me Roy would call me tomorrow. Tomorrow never came. He didn't bother to try to recover a client. I forfeited the deposit, choosing to go with another painter who did an awesome job.

We never had a problem getting in touch with Roy between the time the job was bid and up until the jobs were complete. He arrived on time for both bids, and the bids were well-detailed on what would be included. The crews showed up on time each day to pressure wash, tape, and paint. They arrived early each morning at 8am and left each day at 9pm (13 hours!). They painted our primary home in 3 days; same for the rental. While at our homes the crews were professional and quiet, and performed their work well, we never had any problems with them. They cleaned up every day and left the job site perfectly clean when the jobs were done. It's now one year later and both houses look just as good as the day the painting was completed. We're very satisfied with both the quality of the work and the people who performed it. We would hire them back without hesitation.

House painted August of 2006 by A and R painting. Noticed paint blistering and peeling within two weeks of the completion of the job. Lead painter, Roy Gmitter, led us to believe that they would fix the problems the next summer (2007). Summer of 2007 had many discussions with Aaron Harrington, co-owner A and R, began sincerely. Delays and excuses from Aaron became rule. After many discussions and meetings became clear that Aaron did not intend to correct the problems. His reasons were: first, rain had caused the wood to be wet and second, the siding was poor quality and needed to be replaced; problem not siding for 2 reasons; 1. The paint is blistering on both the original siding and on new addition with new siding. 2. A respected siding contractor stated no reason to replace the siding. I don t believe problem was rain since no rain fell in July and August '06. Problem is a result of 2 things; pressure washing day before applying primer and poor surface prep.

I was really impressed with their attention to detail. I was also impressed with the way they kept everything organized and clean. The had the area sectioned off. The job was handled really well, the work wasn't drawn out, they did what said they were going to do and they tried to keep it as low impact to us as possible.

The overall experience was below average. The paint job was barely adequate. They didn't complete the second coat in all areas, leaving a few "thin" spots that are visible in normal daylight and they left quite a bit of over spray on the front porch. The bigger problem was getting them to do the work in the first place. We had to call repeatedly over the course of the job to complain about them not showing up when they were supposed to - or at all. They had to come back and finish the deck the following summer because they let the house exterior and trim painting drag out until around Halloween.

The good parts: They were swift in completing a good portion of the work. The bad parts: We were talked into getting flat paint to put on our walls, which is not washable (they said it would be). The painter painted over half completed drywall repairs, which clearly shows huge chunks of unsanded drywall mud and holes (areas exceeding two feet in greatest dimension). Other unpainted drywall repairs were only partially completed; we were naive and paid them in full with the promise that the repairs would be taken care of "next week". Next week turned into two months, at which point we asked for a partial refund. We received a $500 refund, and had to pay more than that to have another drywall guy come in and complete the repairs. The areas which had half completed repairs painted over look just awful and we will have to either fix it ourselves or hire someone to fix what they messed up. Overall, a horrible experience, and a costly mistake.