TOM EDENS MASONARY CONTRACTOR

When i started the process, I called 3 different local contractors from Angie's List. The first contractor would not return my calls. I guess he was too busy for size project. The second contractor was fairly thorough with his estimate, however his price seemed very steep (3x What i spent on the job with additional work). I was happy just to get someone to show up for the estimate. When I called Tom, I was initially concerned with a particular review he had on Angie's list. After talking to him, his explanation seemed reasonable. Tom arrived on the agreed upon time and gave me an estimate that I thought was fair. He completed the work in a reasonable time frame. When there were some issues he addressed them very quickly and professionally. He has stated that he does prefer smaller brick and concrete jobs. I would use Tom again for any future brick or concrete jobs. Brick work is expensive. Tom was reasonable and his work was excellent.

Last year we had Tom edens do a job for us by putting up stone on our front porch. While he was here my fiancand eacute; asked him what we could do about the water from our cars sitting in our garage. He said he could put a new layer of cement on top of the original cement and pour it thicker at the back of the garage and thiner towards the door of the garage to allow the water to drain to the driveway. So since he did such good work with the rock on our porch My fiancand eacute; called him in May and scheduled to have him do the work to the garage floor. It only took them two days to do the work. When I got home from work I noticed it didnt look complete but thought maybe it will look better after it settled. Some days went by and it never did look better. There is a slope on the floor like he said he was going to do but the actual concrete job itself doesnt look good. There were foot prints in the concrete and many ridges throughout the floor from where he was trying to make it flat. Someone told me you are supposed to use something called a trial machine to make the concrete look smooth and complete. He was probably trying to save the money from renting one so he tried to smooth it all by a hand tool. He also didnt use a concrete mixer and mixed the concrete all by hand. He probably did that so he could save some money there too. By not using a mixer it can cause the concrete to not look complete either. On top of that after they were done the garage door doesnt close and they left a mess outside. So I called him and told him that we spent too much money on this for it to not look right. His excuse for why it looked bad was because it was raining that day and the water somehow made the concrete not settle right. Well dont you think if the rain is going to mess a job up shouldnt you wait till its not raining. So he came to our house and looked at it and said he could put a thin layer over top of it. So I said if you did that the ridges would probably still be there and if there was any more concrete near the door to the basement it wouldnt look right. I then asked if he could somehow sand the ridges down then after its sanded you do what you got to do to make it all look right. He brought a sander and sanded it down but it still doesnt look complete. There are swirl marks in the concrete and just all around looks bad. After he left I called him and told him again that it doesnt look right. He said he doesnt know what to do. I again told him that this was way too much money to not be satisfied and also asked him if he payed $2800 for a concrete floor in his garage and it looked like that would he he satisfied. He didnt have a response. I asked him if we could have back some of the money so we can take the money and pay someone else to do it right but he just changed the subject. He said well it looks like we arent going to come to an agreement so I will have to think of something and call you back later. He still hasnt called me back. I havent tried to call him because I know its not going to get me anywhere. So needless to say. Do not hire this man for anything!!I filed a complaint with the attorney general, but it didn't get me anywhere. So after we spent $2800 we now have to fix the garage floor ourselves and figure out how to fix the garage door.

I called Mr Edens and requested that he come out and give us an estimate to build a small retaining wall. He came out that afternoon and checked out the job then gave us an estimate. He was scheduled to come out a week later to do the work which he estimated would take about l l/2 days. The night before he was to start the job he called to verify that everything was on schedule as planned. Mr. Edens and his son arrived the next morning at 8 AM and went right to work. They worked until 4 PM. They arrived the next morning at 7:30 AM and worked until about 1 PM. We had a couple of breaks in a coupe of old walls and Mr. also repaired them. Mr. Edens and his son were both very well mannered. We were very pleased with Mr Edens I would definitely have Mr Edens again.

Added fireplace bricks inside chimney

They started the job on schedule and worked for about 3 months, taking longer than predicted due to significant rain days during construction. There was minimal disruption to household operation and to area landscaping. The site was kept clean during the entire job. They did not take other jobs during our construction that would prolong our job.

The job went well. Because of rain delays it took twice as long as initially planned but the finished product is exactly what we planned and the price was what we agreed to initially.