GURGUL & CO

I have thought long and hard about writing this review. I do not wish to speak badly of anyone but we had such a stressful and unpleasant experience with this company that I would like to have other homeowners make an informed decision when hiring a contractor. We had no idea that things would go as they did and really liked Jim when we met him for an estimate and later meetings. We quickly learned that he told us things that were not true and repeatedly did not show up when he said he would. He also added to his price several times. The first time was when we asked him to hang two grab bars, one shower rod, one towel bar and nail down new baseboard in a bathroom. The baseboard had been purchased, stained and cut by my husband but he does not have a nail gun so we asked Jim to do this. Jim agreed but did not say that it would cost us more. Our plumber had offered to do this for no charge when he was here doing his work but Jim was here too so I asked him. After this work was done, he asked me for an additional $500. The additional work in question did not take more than 2 hours ( I was at home while this work was being done). I paid him the additional money the day he asked for it. He never finished doing the baseboards but said that he would finish sometime when he was here working on the deck. He never finished the baseboards. When I asked him about this he told me that I never paid him to nail the baseboards. This was not true. When we signed the contract for Jim to re-build the deck and to build a porch, Jim told us that it was a "4 to 5 day job". He finished our bathroom work on May 24 and said "give me two weeks to finish another job and I will start on your deck". The first deadline we were given was June 30. Note that all the deadlines we were given were set by Jim. We had wanted to have our son's graduation party at our house sometime during the summer but ended up having to rent a place and had the party on Aug. 21. The deck project was finally finished on Aug. 18. There are several uneven boards and damaged boards on our deck and in the porch but we did not want to deal with Jim anymore so we will fix these things ourselves. Jim did not clean up after himself every day or even every week. We did much of the regular clean up but always had a mess on the deck and in the yard. Jim left a big mess in the porch after he applied foam insulation around the windows (something he said my husband had to do and we did not ask him - nor want him- to do). He said the mess would easily clean up but the excess does not come off and we spent hours trying to clean that up. Jim gave us 6 different completion deadlines and did not meet any of them. It was constant frustration. The biggest incident that concerned us the most was the purchasing of the windows and door for the porch. JIm was never able to tell us what brand, type or cost of windows that he was supposedly purchasing from a supplier. He did go to a local building supply store with me to show me an comparable window. When we did this, the window in the store was half the price of what he was charging us. So, he asked me if I wanted to talk with the supply house to ask my questions. I said yes. I was told the price of the windows and nothing more. Jim later angrily told me it was none of my business to speak to his supplier (he made the offer, placed the call and gave me the phone). Jim was never able to tell us anything about the windows so we purchased them ourselves from a local store. Jim also did not order the door when he said he did so we purchased that also. He charged us the regular price but the door was on sale and we wanted to get the sale price so we purchased the door ourselves. Jim said that he did not mark up the price of the materials he used but I question this. I have no facts to back me up, just the feeling that he was adding to the cost whenever he could. I would like to say that there was extra work that needed to be done to repair the basic structure of the deck that we did not know was there. We knew there were problems with the structure but did not know the extent until the surface of the original deck was removed. We were grateful that Jim found the problems and fixed them in the course of his build. We knew about, and paid for extra work for that. But Jim presented us with a much larger bill than he ever estimated for this. I did question this higher amount and Jim himself lowered the price upon my questioning. I appreciated that and thanked him. I paid him the additional amount that same day. He later told me that I "stiffed him" the additional money. That insult I did not appreciate nor was it true. By this time we were done taking his insults, his nasty behavior and his lies. We just wanted this project done. Our deck had been torn up all summer and we could not use it with our kids home from college. I had to pay for a venue for a party for our son. And we readily paid some cost over runs on the project but I was not going to be charged unfairly. Jim said to me once during the course of the project to "get other bids to see that my price is more than fair". Well, I took him up on his suggestion. I asked another builder used by a friend if he would come over and estimate the work that we were having done. He did and said that we were paying "top dollar" and that the price we were paying was "way at the top of the range for this type of job". We generally liked Jim's work and felt it would be too difficult to have someone else finish the job. We felt that he was a craftsman and that is why we hired him. He was not happy when I asked him to correct some things. I am a particular person and wanted the job done right. I don't think that I was unreasonable and definitely let some things slide that I now wish were corrected. We love our deck and porch but do not have good memories of the process

Did not arrange for proper permit so that work could begin on time. Demolished original garage, but took several weeks and had a "friend who owed him a favor" finish the demolition. After the demolition, had to wait four months for the start of construction on the new garage, which took two months. Was not reliable about showing up on a consistent basis, did not return phone calls in a timely fashion, oftentimes did not show up for work as promised, and sometimes brought his kids along on the job to wait in his truck parked in the driveway. Overall, a highly regrettable experience.