JCR Construction

I was robbed of both money and time by this individual. When I first contacted him regarding the remodeling of my kitchen he was very prompt and attentive. We set a date & time to begin the project & I requested vacation time so that I could be at home when the remodeling began. He kept making excuses for why the cabinets couldn't be delivered as scheduled & the delivery date kept being pushed back. He blamed it on the cabinet makers. When I told him I had contacted the cabinet company and set a date for delivery he got upset and told me he needed to be there so that he could inspect the cabinets as they were coming off the truck. A new date was scheduled so that he could be there. The cabinets came, he wasn't there, they sat in the dining room in boxes for a week unopened and uninspected. Fortunately there was no damage. He showed up with his unskilled laborer (Ray) and gutted the kitchen. That was on a Tuesday and I didn't hear back from him for 3 days. The next time they showed up he left and Ray slapped plaster on the ceiling with a mop head and Jim called it a masterpiece (it wasn't). To top it off they had tracked plaster from the kitchen throughout the house, damaging the carpet. They then cut the wood flooring IN THE HOUSE with no plastic over the doorways and I came home to sawdust and grime all throughout the house. There were 1" spaces between the door jams and the new floor and when I pointed this out Jim's comment was, "I've seen worse". When I told him that I wanted him to remove the wallpaper and patch the walls before hanging the new cabinets he assured me he would. The next evening I came home and the wallpaper wasn't removed, the walls hadn't been patched and the cabinets were in place. The cabinets weren't level and wood was cracked on several of the cabinets. The cabinets that were hung on the cinderblock wall were attached to the cinderblock with regular dry wall screws-not masonary screws. The cabinets would have fallen off the wall as soon as I put dishes in them. I'd had enough! I called him and left messages for him to call me. For three days I called and left messages and never heard from him. But that wasn't unusual not to hear from him after leaving messages---he was always having problems with his phone (he blamed it on his kids, his wife, he misplaced his phone, etc.) I had the locks changed on the front door and left an envelope in the door in case he showed up. He showed up and called me upset that he couldn't get in the house to install the counter tops! Because he couldn't get in the front door he busted the gate to the backyard and it had to be replaced. I had to hire another contractor who had to clean up the mess left by Jim before he could start on the kitchen. I had to replace cabinet pieces that were damaged by Jim. Supplies bought on a pre-paid Lowe's card were missing. I had to buy new wood flooring to replace the damaged flooring. The list goes on and on. I'm going to have to take this individual to court to recover not only the money that he was paid up front (I know, big mistake to pay up front--but this guy was referred to me by someone I work with so I thought he was reliable) and I'm suing him for the costs of replacing the damaged items.