Chicks in Construction

In this episode of Chicks in Construction, Mikki Paradis and her co-host Jessica Abreu dive into a jaw-dropping homeowner horror story. The hosts discuss the shocking experience of Jake and his family, who moved into their dream home only to discover severe structural issues due to gross negligence by their contractor and the county inspections department. With foundation failures, code violations, and a battle to hold the builder accountable, this episode highlights the importance of due diligence, third-party inspections, and understanding the limitations of legal and insurance recourse in construction. Tune in for an eye-opening conversation on one of the worst-case scenarios in home construction.

00:00 Napkin Plans and Construction Realities

01:04 Welcome to Chicks in Construction

01:34 Super Bowl and Small Talk

03:50 Dog Tales and Special Trash

10:16 Homeowner Horror Story Introduction

13:08 The Chatham County Construction Nightmare

29:03 Builder Red Flags and Permitting Office Blunders

29:24 Accidental Email Exposes Structural Issues

30:35 Homeowner's Legal Battle Begins

32:33 Contractor's License Suspended and Fined

32:51 Licensing Board's Worst Code Violations Case

38:54 Homeowner's Insurance and Legal Struggles

45:16 Homeowner Recovery Fund Limitations

51:34 Advice for Future Homeowners

01:00:20 Closing Thoughts and Call to Action

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www.chicksinconstruction.com

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Creators and Guests

Host

Jessica Abreu

As a social media expert, Jessica has a knack for identifying what makes each business unique and translating that into powerful, engaging content that resonates with clients and customers. From crafting tailored strategies and managing accounts to recording on-site content and boosting engagement, Jessica and her team handle it all so their clients can focus on what they do best.

Host

Mikki Paradis

President & CEO at PDI Drywall Inc. Mikki founded her first construction company, PDI Drywall Inc, in 2005 while she was still a student at NC State. After growing PDI into a multimillion dollar company, she has become an accomplished entrepreneur, speaker, and advocate for innovation in business and leadership. With a passion for empowering others, she has built a reputation as a forward-thinking professional dedicated to driving growth and fostering meaningful connections. Known for her dynamic energy and ability to inspire, Mikki is deeply committed to creating positive change in her industry and beyond. Whether through her entrepreneurial ventures or speaking engagements, she consistently challenges the status quo and encourages others to reach their full potential.

What is Chicks in Construction?

You plan your renovation with excitement, trust your contractor, and hope for the best...until things start going sideways. That’s when most homeowners realize they didn’t know what they didn’t know.

From permits that were never pulled to “contractors” who ghost after demo day, the construction world can feel like a maze of hidden costs and shady shortcuts. Too many homeowners end up confused, overwhelmed, and out of a lot of money.

The Chicks in Construction Podcast is here to change that. Hosted by Mikki Paradis, a licensed general contractor with 20+ years of experience, and Jess Abreu, a homeowner turned construction content creator, this show breaks down real renovation horror stories and teaches you how to protect your time, money, and home.

After building a multimillion-dollar drywall business and helping countless homeowners recover from construction nightmares, Mikki is on a mission to make sure you go into your next project informed, not blindsided. And Jess brings the perspective of someone who’s been in your shoes and now knows exactly what questions to ask.

Submit Your Construction Horror Story: https://chicksinconstruction.com/

34 Chicks in Construction
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Mikki: [00:00:00] I was asking about the inspections process and this guy says to me, he goes, I'm not gonna lie to you. I've had, I've built houses based off of plans I drew on the back of a napkin.

Jessica: Great.

Mikki: Like right hand to God. He was not, he was not BSing me.

He drew plans on the back of a napkin once and submitted that to get a permit and was given a permit.

I, Hmm. So

Jessica: many questions.

Mikki: There's so like, what? And, and the reason why that matters is because the plans, like I say this all the time in construction, the plans are our Bible. We build everything off of the plans, everything even in drywall. Mm-hmm. I, when I'm estimating, I spend so much time reading through the plans because the plans, they supersede everything.

They tell us how everything goes. They tell us where everything goes. Mm-hmm. They are the Bible. [00:01:00] Well, hello and welcome back to another episode of Chicks in Construction. I am your host, Mickey Paradise, and this is my co-host.

Jessica: Hi, I'm Jessica, April,

Mikki: and we have a delightful home in our horrors. Well, I say delightful. It, it's. Honestly terrible. But we do have a home homeowner horror story for today. Mm-hmm. But before that, we're, we're gonna chicky chat. We're gonna chicky chat and the Chicky chat needs to be about obviously the, the main event.

Well, this will be old news for you guys, but it's new news for us. 'cause yesterday was the Super Bowl. Bowl, super Bowl. Mm-hmm. And some people call it the Super Bowl, but I call it the Bad Bunny concert that had football, intermixed,

Jessica: intermixed.

Mikki: It was a Mixy mo and I was like, Hmm. Bad bunny. Yes.

Jessica: Yeah, no, I watched the Super Bowl and I was excited for it because my team, the Patriots, I know they did terrible.

Were in it, but, you know, I mean, they, they blew it, which is [00:02:00] fine. Um,

Mikki: that poor quarterback,

Jessica: I mean, I still love Greg

Mikki: mad if he got sacked one more time. I like, I think, I hope that they. I hope they checked, did a brain scan. 'cause that kid got rocked.

Jessica: I know. Poor thing.

Mikki: Apparently he's like from Chapel Hill.

Jessica: No, he's from, um, Huntersville. Where? Huntersville? I don't Huntersville. Yeah. North Carolina. Yeah. They both look,

Mikki: he looks a little bit more huntersville than Chapel Hill. I don't know what that means, but

Jessica: Yeah. And his wife is too, like they,

Mikki: he's a little bit more country like Chapel Hill's, like a little bit more, um, I'm gonna say for lack of better words, it's like a yuppie ish, and maybe that's not the right word.

It's, it's like, um. I don't know. Listen, chapel Hill gives me pinkies up vibes

Jessica: pinkies up. Okay

Mikki: then so this guy was not giving pinkies up vibes and so I was a little confused. Yeah, but Huntersville, I don't know where that is, but I'm guessing they don't do pinkies up there.

Jessica: I don't think so.

Mikki: Listen, we just went in a whole direction.

If you're from Huntersville and you do, do Pinky's up, forgive [00:03:00] us. Yes. Or me, Jess was actually, wasn't part of that problem. I was like, I dunno what that ring is. Like, don't roll me into this.

Jessica: Not my fault. Um,

Mikki: don't come for her in the comments,

Jessica: but, um. Yeah, just getting to the Super Bowl was amazing 'cause last year they only won four games.

Mikki: Oh wow. They

Jessica: really turned it around this year. They really turned it around this year. So like, they should be proud of themselves for getting there and then they choked. It's fine.

Mikki: Yeah,

Jessica: it's great. It's all

Mikki: fine. Happens. Didn't Carolina do that like many ago? I mean, I, I remember one time we went to the Super Bowl and I was like, really?

We did. We're going and then we lost real bad and it was like, that actually tracks.

Default_2026-02-09_1: Yeah.

Jessica: I didn't think that we were going to win, but I was hoping that we would score, um, before the fourth quarter that

Mikki: was Yeah. They really, you know, but they tried real hard at the end.

Jessica: They, they did.

Mikki: It's funny 'cause we don't watch the sports.

Me and Hector are not Sports Watchers. Mm-hmm. Um. We prefer to watch random things on YouTube. Like some British guy that likes to fix cars in his garage. We're into that. We're mostly not [00:04:00] into the sports. It's not a thing.

Jessica: And see, like, I'm not gonna watch some British guy fix the car.

Mikki: Oh yeah. We love, he like, it's, it's interesting.

He used to be a BM Xer and he started like just fixing cars in his, like literal a not garage, just his driveway. And now he is like multimillionaire just from fixing cars on, on

Jessica: YouTube, so on with his special trash and his fix, his love of fixing cars and like toilets because he has spare parts.

Mikki: Special toilet, special.

It's ridiculous. Yeah. He, I, Hector has actually talked about that. He's so Callie. Mm-hmm. Which is my pocket bully.

Jessica: Yes.

Mikki: And she's a whole lot you guys. She's a whole lot. And that's Hector's girlfriend. Mm-hmm. So Callie and Hector, Callie tries to push me outta the bed. And I'm like, I will cut you and then I will pay for your vet care, but I will cut you so you better watch yourself.

Last night she was literally trying to push me out of the bed with her tiny little T-Rex arms. She's like, she's like [00:05:00] 43 pounds, but her arms are, I'm not kidding. They're six inches long. Yeah, max, max six. She cannot scratch anything on her body. She can't reach anything. Um, that's his little girlfriend, so he.

At an auction, bought some special trash. Of course, it's called a casita and it's like this travel, this tiny little travel trailer. Like, like a, like a camper.

Jessica: Okay.

Mikki: And Hector bought this thing knowing full well there was 0% chance that Mickey Paradise.

Jessica: I was gonna say, so are you gonna go

Mikki: camper getting in this thing?

Absolute.

Jessica: Oh, come on. I have Okay. Money to

Mikki: see this. Absolutely not. I have a camper that I have used a total of one time that I fully renovated to be the most bougie camper you've seen. And you've ever, ever used it one in your life? I used it once. We went camping. It was terrible. I was like, this was where?

Where's garbage? Where's it's at the Youngsville house.

Jessica: That's where the special trash,

Mikki: it says it's a special trash graveyard. So like he buys this, this ca little casino [00:06:00] and he goes, babe, I've got an idea. And I'm like, tell me the idea. He goes, I'm gonna renovate this, this camper. And I'm gonna call it the Callie Casita, and I'm gonna take Callie with me, and we're gonna go on camping trips and I'm gonna start a YouTube channel of just me and Callie camping.

And I was like, wow. I didn't even get asked. Like he didn't even ask if I wanted to go camping. It was like, he just new, he was like, she's absolutely not gonna go

Jessica: this hysterical. So,

Mikki: but Callie is down for whatever.

Jessica: Yeah. She's gonna have

Mikki: her Tucker's doing it. Callie's there. She's amazing's like a hundred percent.

Jessica: I mean, I would watch that, but, but they ha But he has

Mikki: to

Default_2026-02-09_1: show

Mikki: that

Jessica: you want no part of it, because like, that's what makes it,

Mikki: it has to be me, like ushering them out the door to be like, well, have a great weekend. Like the, like I just can't, I was, I was like. I honestly think it would be enjoyable to watch though, because like Callie is [00:07:00] a ridiculous creature.

Jessica: She is. She's so, like the other day,

Mikki: God,

Jessica: like when I, I went to Nikki's house to, to do some stuff and um, Kelly comes up with her, her little dog toy. Yeah. And she's like this high off the ground. Yeah. So she's near my knee.

Mikki: Yeah. Barely.

Jessica: And she's like, here, here's my toy. She, here's my toy, here's my toy. And I'm like, look, okay, do you wanna get, because I don't have dogs.

I like, I have no idea what to

Mikki: do. No. Jess is with dogs, but I'm with kids. I'm like, what? I'm like, oh, do I touch you? What do I do with you?

Jessica: Do you want, do you wanna give me the toy because I don't want you to bite me, but it looks like you're trying to get, so I take it.

Mikki: And

Jessica: Kelly

Mikki: was devastated. She's like, no, no, this

Default_2026-02-09_1: isn't

Jessica: the game.

She like, no, that's not what I want. Then she's like, pawing at me. I was like, okay. She's like, give it back. Give it back here, have it back. And she runs away and she comes back and she's like, Hey, look at this. I have a toy. I was like, it's the same freaking

Mikki: thing. Same freaking thing. It's great.

Jessica: Oh yeah.

Mikki: And so the thing I had to tell Jess, the clue dress in, and this is something we've done, like we've done this with her.

She wants you to be very impressed with her toy. So whenever Callie [00:08:00] comes into the room with a toy, Hector goes, well, well look at that toy. Well, so now if you don't. Say, well, Callie, look at that toy. She won't leave you alone. She, and then when you do, you have to do it five times until she feels like properly praised.

Mm-hmm. Like, you have a, you have truly appreciated it, her

Jessica: toy,

Mikki: the greatness of this toy. Then she's like, all right, thank you. I shall go and chew on this toy now.

Jessica: I did not do it well because she was, she was there not

Mikki: impressed.

Jessica: Oh. She even, she would have the toy in her mouth and like, we were talking and she's like, pawing at my, she's she, excuse me.

Come. This is come long. Come. This is important. I have a toy. You have not noticed my toy.

Mikki: You've not properly acknowledged my toy and I will not leave you alone until you do. It was a whole thing. She's a, a whole thing. Mm.

Jessica: And then Prime threw up almost on me,

Mikki: on my way up. Oh my God. That was so bad. That was another $1,200 vet visit.

People, people don't understand. I talk [00:09:00] all the time. I'm like, listen, like, like Alyssa, my niece, she lives with us. She's 22. And I'm like, listen, I, dogs are great. And I like, I think everybody should have a dog. But you get, start with a small dog until you have stupid and like, listen, I don't, don't get twisted.

I don't have stupid amounts of money, but I'm just never gonna retire because I'd be spending, I made the choice to get a 200 pound dog and they are so expensive. Like our food bill is a thousand dollars a month. And then, then he goes to the vet and it's guaranteed a thousand dollars. Yeah. This time it was almost $1,200.

Oh my God. And I was like, I quit.

Jessica: Yeah. And big dogs, they have big amounts of

Mikki: everything. Vomit. Yeah.

Jessica: He owned, it was, it was like he did almost drove a shoe. Bye.

Mikki: Yeah.

Jessica: And, and I'm out.

Mikki: Yeah. It was, it was so horrifying. I was like, okay, bye. Go out the door. Lemme deal with this. Like, go get the wheelbarrow to clean this up.

It was [00:10:00] terrible.

Jessica: I had just thrown out the

Mikki: rug. Yeah. No, it was a Hector. I'm the vomit cleaner. 'cause Hector does sympathy vomiting and he, no matter who it is, it's he, Hector, he does sympathy. No sympathy. So he can't clean up the vong bombs. It's a Mickey job. And I'm like, great.

Jessica: Here we go.

Mikki: So let's, we're gonna get into the story.

Um. I'm gonna preface this one with, when I shared this story with Jess, so mm-hmm. I was talking to a potential guest and she was like, we're talking about homeowner horror stories. And she's like, have you heard about this guy in Chatham County? She was like, it's all over the news. He actually has his own YouTube channel to talk about the things that happened.

Wow. Mm-hmm. And, and like the, the status of everything. He has a Facebook page. She was like, have you, have you heard of the story? And so I hadn't, I looked it up. Oh my gosh. It is wild. I actually reached out to him, um, and had a couple email exchanges with him just to like, clarify information. Mm-hmm. Get, get updates 'cause there hadn't been any [00:11:00] updates in like a year.

Um, but when I sent this to you. Jess's response was like this kind of count contradicts some of the things that we're always preaching about. And one of the things that we're always preaching about is the importance of getting inspections. Mm-hmm. Um, and the importance of like, doing your research and what this story shows you and why we're sharing it with you.

Even though it kind of does go against, I don't wanna say it goes against, but maybe in some ways goes against the things that we've shared, is the importance of understanding all of the potential variables. Yes. So,

Jessica: so nothing is necessarily like black and white.

Mikki: Right. There is so many shades of gray.

Mm-hmm. And I feel like this is probably, and, and as the podcast evolves and we get more stories, there might be worse stories, but I don't know.

Jessica: I mean, this and the one where like there's not a house and they spent three [00:12:00] like that,

Mikki: that, but the la Yeah. That last one that we found. Yeah. Like.

Jessica: They're both bad.

Mikki: They're bad. And so I'm like, I think the channel is really just gonna turn into like true crime construction edition.

Jessica: Yes. We're gonna dig in and like

Mikki: find out all the dirt. It's just, we're gonna just start being like, listen, we're naming names. This one we're naming names on because one, it's all over the internet.

The news has covered it on multiple occasions. It's apparently other pod Jake, apparently, according to the guy, the homeowner, other podcasters have talked about it. And

Jessica: so nobody's anonymous, so I

Mikki: don't have to worry. Nobody's anonymous. Um, and the, the builder that he, he used and sued, lost the lawsuit, so.

Look, it's public record at this point. So we naming names today. We naming names. So listen guys, um, we are trying to up our game. We're stepping our game. We have a script. I don't know how how it's gonna go that. I mean,

Jessica: a loosely based, this is what you should try. We we're trying,

Mikki: trying really hard. [00:13:00] We're gonna try,

Jessica: we're

Mikki: trying so

Jessica: hard.

Stay focused. So stay focused. That's the, the word. Word of

Mikki: the year

Jessica: focus.

Mikki: So, okay. Um, this one is, is is similar in a sense to the one where, um, hundreds of thousands of dollars have been spent and not recovered. Um, it's based outta Chatham County here in North Carolina, which is in like the Pittsboro, I think.

Um, also. Isn't Carbo also Chatham County?

Jessica: You were asking

Mikki: the person who just moved that

Jessica: North Carolina four

Mikki: years ago. Worse, that is Chatham County, um, which is like a county over. Um, so it's close for us and it is wild. We're gonna get into it, but what hundreds of thousands of dollars and literal years of legal battles are what we're, where we're looking at.

Jessica: So, um, so this is [00:14:00] about Jake and his family. They moved into their home in June, 2020. So what a terrible time to move. Oh God. Yeah. Remember, remember those days? Um, they believed that they had done their due diligence, vetting the contractor, checking references, and even visiting completed homes that the contractor had built.

So doing all the things that we say that you're supposed to do, they

Mikki: literal say, Hey, he did all the research. That's why part of this story is so hard because. We, I cannot find a single thing that he did that was like, oh, that was, that was the, that, that

Jessica: was the red

Mikki: flag that you should have known the major mistake.

Mm-hmm. Because even like the one red flag that I feel like is there, I don't think your average homeowner would have any idea.

Jessica: Mm-hmm.

Mikki: That this is a sign of bigger things.

Jessica: Gotcha.

Mikki: And so, just so you guys, this has been going on for over five years. I wanted to make sure we referenced that. So the deal, [00:15:00] so like Jess said, they go out, they find this gc, they did all the things, they checked with.

Previous home builders mm-hmm. Or previous home buyers, they walked through houses that he had done. The one distinction that Jake mentioned was that everything that they had done were just really small ranch homes. And so what he wanted to build was, was a two story house that sat out on a foundation, a raised foundation, not a slab.

So everything that he had done previously that he, that he had seen and that he had toured was like what they call a slab on grade. Mm-hmm. So it's like where they grade the lot, they put in the undergrounds and then they, they porched the concrete slab and that's what the house is built on. So he wanted to build, you know, an actual raised foundation where the house is like built on that.

Mm-hmm. Structurally, you, there's a lot more that goes into the, that structurally than when you're building slab on grade.

One of the things that was that red flag [00:16:00] mm-hmm. Um, was while they were in the middle of building the actual foundation failed. And I saw a picture of it. So like, when you're building a raised foundation, you dig out and, and depending on how it all goes, it it is, it's like a 12 by 12, it depends on what the engineer, um, specifies.

But you dig out the foundation, you pour that with concrete, and then you build with bricks or blocks up, and you, that's where you put your structural framing members and they sit on the pillars and the, and the, the structural members that you have in place. That you kind of in that underground. Okay. So.

They start to build up. They, they normally, like once all the, the concrete is in and all the, all the, the, the block work is done and the pillars and the posts are in, they'll then backfill that area with gravel A lot of times. Sometimes they don't, sometimes they do. It just depends. Higher end homes, [00:17:00] normally they will backfill that with gravel.

So I saw the picture of when the actual foundation walls failed. They, the CMU block just literally collapsed over.

Jessica: What is A CMU

Mikki: for? CMU is like a concrete block.

Jessica: Okay.

Mikki: So a lot of times they'll use the concrete block to build up and then they'll put brick or brick veneer, so it doesn't look kind of cheap.

Okay. But most of the time your foundation is like a CMU block. It's a concrete block. So that is supposed to have, depending on how your engineer designs it, it's supposed to have rebar or like.

Jessica: Something

Mikki: in it. Make it metal pieces in there to hold, hold the structure to tie in the brick to mm-hmm. The poured concrete that's kind of underneath where the, the concrete block is.

Default_2026-02-09_1: That

Jessica: makes sense. We did a concrete pool and they had rebar in there to

Mikki: Right. Keep the structure.

Jessica: Yeah.

Mikki: What he didn't know, because why would he, if he's not in construction, is the fact [00:18:00] that that wall fell over meant that there was not the proper rebar or the proper brackets, or it wasn't tied in appropriately and he didn't know that, that that's what that foundation falling over meant.

Jessica: If the foundation of a home that I was going to live in fell over before anything else was put on it, I would think that that would be like one wood, let's stop

Mikki: one

Jessica: wood. Let's just, let's

Mikki: just stop. The problem was like when, so the picture that I saw, like when the foundation failed, the house was already built.

It was like in the,

Jessica: oh, it wasn't

Mikki: like, no, it wasn't like, oh, the foundation fell while we were, it was like the weight of the house went on and then the foundation fell.

Jessica: Oh, okay. Well then you're up creek.

Mikki: You're kind up creek. The creek. Without Paddle Creek. Without paddle. A paddle. Paddle. Yeah. So

Jessica: jinx.

Mikki: So it, it was a partial collapse, and that was kind of the first major red flag.

Mm. So the, the builder kind of plays it off, like it's not that big of a deal. Um, your

Jessica: house is just pulling

Mikki: down is fine. You know, it is fine as that shit happens. Things fit, it's [00:19:00] fine. Don't, don't complain about things. Um, and they move in so that if they finish the, like what's crazy about this is like 99% of our homeowner horror stories are, and then they never finish the house.

And I had to bring somebody else in to finish it. And like in this story, that would've been the best case scenario for this guy. If that, if that builder just walked, they walked

Jessica: away

Mikki: because he would've realized before the house was complete that there was major issues going on. Mm-hmm. So they move into the house and they started noticing like, all houses settle.

So one of the things that, I don't know if, if how much we know about this, but we don't dry wood out the way we used to back in the day. Like, there's such a high demand for, for lumber mm-hmm. That it doesn't get dried out the way that it used to. So all wood that they're building with is still a little wet.

So there is a period of settling. Especially in North Carolina, 'cause we have these wild, you know, wildly hot summers and then some, like this winter [00:20:00] is so cold, there's a lot of contraction and expansion that happens as the temperature changes, especially for wood that hasn't been fully dried. So when you buy a new house, it's not super uncommon for you to get nail pops and for you to get some settling and a little, some cracks in the drywall, but it's really minimal what was happening in this house.

The floors were buckling. So it started with them noticing that there were dips in the floor that were up to three inches difference. So he put a level on the floor and it, there was three inches of play of how it was moving. The cabinets started coming off the walls because the house was moving so much that the cabinets were staying in place, but the framing itself was moving.

Um, oh my gosh. The doors weren't latching because the doorframes were twist twisting so much. Mm-hmm. That it wasn't [00:21:00] catching the, the latch plate. And so he goes to the builder and he's like, Hey, something major is happening in the house. Can you come out? And the builder just doesn't respond. He doesn't respond to anything.

He's just, oh, it's settling. It's fine. We have settling year. Chase is nothing. Right. No big deal. So this guy eventually reaches out to the county. So mind you, this was all above board. So he knew, um, all the, it had all the inspections, the mm-hmm. The builder was licensed, like everything was above board. Um, he goes to the county inspections and he says, listen, we are having some real problems with our house.

I would like to schedule a courtesy inspection to have somebody come out. Mm-hmm. And, and look at what's going on with our house. Um, and that's where, you know, when we always talk about the importance of having inspections and how the inspections are, are exist to protect you.

Default_2026-02-09_1: Mm-hmm. [00:22:00]

Mikki: Who, in this case, the exact opposite happened.

So he goes to the county and he says, listen, something's going on. Can't get the builder to come out and look at it. Can you come inspect my house? I paid for all these inspections. Right. You passed it. What's going on with my house? So they come out, they inspect the house and kind of just tried to not answer him.

They tried to just be like, Hmm, we did inspect it. Um, so he goes out and gets a third party engineer. Engineer comes in and is like, this is major. So none of the house of the framing, the structural framing mm-hmm. Was to code. There was no less than 30 code violations in a brand new house.

Jessica: Mm-hmm.

Mikki: That had just been inspected by Chatham [00:23:00] County Inspections.

All the inspections passed. None of it was structurally sound. So they literally had structural walls that were not sitting on anything that could support the house, the, the, the structure of those walls. And this was a multi, it was a two story house. So you've got a massive amount of load that's sitting on those structural walls.

Yeah. And there's nothing supporting it. So the house was literally just crumbling in. So what's wild is this guy, his name's Jake Moba, he starts putting pressure on the county. He starts saying, okay, listen, what's going on?

Jessica: , So once the, the home is occupied in the. Defects piled up. The contractor referred to as Lin Linley.

Mikki: Linley Builders.

Jessica: Linley Builders,

Mikki: yes. Incorporated or something like that. Incorporated. LLC,

Jessica: you know, all the, all the letters after it was originally a licensed contractor, but [00:24:00] what happened next would change everything.

And that's where Jake's legal battle really, it got startled. Um, so he uncovered that the contractor's building permit was issued with homemade.

Mikki: Oh yes.

Jessica: Partial hand sketched plans. Not engineered drawings. So that is dooming from the start. 'cause like, you can't have you, I can't be out here drawing a picture like my patio.

Like your

Mikki: patio. I like So listen. I was looking at land in, in the mountains in North Carolina a couple years ago, and I was talking to different, um, people. 'cause I don't, I know how to build a house on flatland. I don't know enough about building a house on, not flatland. So I had a lot of questions.

Mm-hmm. And so I was, I was reaching out to a lot of different people and I was asking about the inspections process and this guy says to me, he goes, I'm not gonna lie to you. [00:25:00] I've had, I've built houses based off of plans I drew on the back of a napkin.

Jessica: Great.

Mikki: Like right hand to God. He was not, he was not BSing me.

He drew plans on the back of a napkin once and submitted that to get a permit and was given a permit.

I, Hmm. So

Jessica: many questions.

They tell us how everything goes. They tell us where everything goes. Mm-hmm. They are the Bible. Everything is referred to the plans. When there's a question, what do the plans say? Mm-hmm. It is, it's biblical. [00:26:00] So the fact that there were plans drawn, but there was not somebody to say, okay, you, you have to calculate load, you have to calculate span.

There is so much that goes into the production, especially of the structural set of the plans. Right. It is very high level. Our architects and engineers are licensed for a reason

Jessica: and like That's what I was gonna ask, like shouldn't it have been an engineer or an architect that drew up the plans for

Mikki: this and they should be required to be stamped.

Like that's the other thing. I know that for renovations where you're not moving anything structural, I'm pretty sure you can get away with not having stamped structural plans. Mm-hmm. Because. The county isn't gonna take the legal responsibility that, you know, this has been calculated correctly. So they wanna make sure that a, that an engineer or an architect

Jessica: has done

Mikki: it, has like done all the words, words, words and some numbers.

Mm-hmm. And made sure that like, this house is not going to collapse on [00:27:00] itself.

Jessica: Right.

Mikki: That did not happen here.

Jessica: Mm-hmm.

Mikki: It's a huge deal.

Jessica: Yeah. And so then the county inspector responsible for overseeing inspections, who is Danny Gunther, he ended up being terminated from his position and his supervisor was demoted and the state fire marshal's office blocked him from ever recertifying due to gross negligence.

Mikki: Right.

Jessica: Because like, so you, somebody comes in with like this piece of paper with a hands gas drawing and you're like, yes. That

Mikki: like build it here, there's your permit and then you put this Lego, inspect the house based off of. Hand drawn plans and, and then we're, we're shocked when, when it doesn't go right, there was a wild amount of code violations.

And that, that's the part to me that I'm just like, just, just to like back this up a second, why will say when you [00:28:00] are building a new construction home, I felt like it went without saying that like whatever drawings you have you, that you have to make sure they were drawn by an architect. Mm-hmm. And I, like, I know that a lot of general contractors, I have done this myself, have drawn, this is what I want the house to look like.

I've never submitted that for a permit. It's like, okay, I send that to the architect or to the engineer and

Jessica: then they take

Mikki: that and make it and I'm, and make this. Make sense. You know, make this reality that's not

Jessica: Yes,

Mikki: that's what I do. Mm-hmm. I build the thing, you tell me where to put the things to make it safe.

So one thing to note in this story is if you're building a new construction house and you're working with a builder and they give you a set of plans, if it does not have a stamp from an architect or an engineer, that is a red flag,

Jessica: red flag.

Mikki: That is a big red flag. And the thing, the thing that, like, I don't know where we're covering it, but I wanna make sure it's mentioned when this guy reaches out to the, to [00:29:00] the permitting office.

They started exchanging emails and they accidentally forwarded him an email that was not meant for him. So they forwarded him an email thread. Mm-hmm. And like, the stupidity of these people is like, how,

Jessica: how do you guys have jobs?

Mikki: How? Well, I mean, my god, today. So these two, the, the guy that got fired and the guy that got demoted mm-hmm.

They had a little email exchange going on. Oh. And accidentally forwarded that to the, to the homeowner. And in the email they talk about how the framing was recently done, that it is really bad and probably not structurally sound. And then talk. And then the one guy says like, I think the guy who was like the main inspector was like, but please don't mention that to the homeowner.

Why? Because they inspected it and gave it the all good and don't, didn't [00:30:00] want the homeowner to know that it was really bad. So then the homeowner starts pushing. Mm-hmm. He starts, he wants to know from the people who we thought were the authorities who we're giving all this power over us. Mm-hmm. We're saying, Hey, inspect this.

Tell me that I'm safe. Tell me that it's right. Mm-hmm. He wanted them to say, is my house dangerous or not? So, and this email wasn't sent to them, but it was, it was released in discovery because he ended up suing the county. He ended up suing the, the, the builder. Mm-hmm. But it was re released in discovery that there was an email exchange where they were trying to weigh whether they should tell this guy that within weeks his house could collapse.

So they, how is it something that you're gonna antics? So he was like, he wants the emails, read something along the lines of. He wants to know if the house is safe. I could tell him that at the time of [00:31:00] that, Larry inspected it. It was not going to fail in that moment. But the truth is, it's a matter of weeks that the house could, could fail.

We then, now mind you, this guy has two young ch young, young daughters and his wife all living in this house

Jessica: and like that shouldn't even be something that you consider,

Mikki: right?

Jessica: Is someone's house gonna fall down? You tell them

Mikki: like, absolutely you are. This is, how

Jessica: does that not

Mikki: going on? But they were thinking is how do we mitigate our responsibility in this?

We passed this house. We, there are 30, no less than 30 code violations in this house that we passed and allowed these people to move in. We didn't hold this homeowner accountable, or not the homeowner. We didn't hold the home builder accountable. And now these people are living in a house. That is completely and totally unsafe.

And the fact that the county was like, Hmm, shouldn't we tell him? And that his kids might die in their sleep.

Jessica: What? And the house just falls down.

Mikki: Yeah.

Jessica: [00:32:00] And like the contractor, his license was only suspended. For

Mikki: six months.

Jessica: Yeah, six months. And he had a $5,000 fine in remedial training.

Mikki: Yeah. So I'm

Jessica: like, he knows nothing.

Yeah. He shouldn't be allowed to build a home

Mikki: ever,

Jessica: ever again.

Mikki: It's absolutely wild. The GC board, um, called the case the worst mm-hmm. Set of code violations they had ever seen. That's the licensing board in North Carolina said that this was the worst set of code violations they had ever seen. And then gave this guy right back his license

Jessica: six months later,

Mikki: right back his license.

Oh, stop

Jessica: on the,

Mikki: so it's one of those things where it's like, it's funny 'cause on, on some of the comments on some of our videos, people will, will, who, I don't know what experiences they've had, but they'll make these comments where like, oh, a general contractor license doesn't matter. And oh, inspectors are this, that, you know, they're, they're not God and you are Right.

Inspectors aren't God. Mm-hmm. And you're right. You know, a, a license is just a piece of paper be that proves that you [00:33:00] pass a test, but. What are we supposed to do? Like we're, these things exist as guardrails. Mm-hmm. So that homeowners are trying to hedge their bets to have the best experience that they can

Jessica: to have a safe home.

Mikki: Right. You know, it's like, so the home doesn't collapse on. So it's like these things exist and there should be consequences. And I think the thing that we've learned, especially over the last two home and horror stories mm-hmm. Is that there are not nearly enough consequences. So one thing that I do wanna say to the people that watch that feel like it doesn't matter, it's do glue, somebody's licensed and doesn't, and, and it doesn't matter whether you get inspections or not, you hear this story and you're like, see, see I told you.

And the point is, this should have never happened. This is a homeowner horror story that should have never happened. These people did the right thing. They ha. Hired a licensed general contractor, the licensing board, 100% failed this homeowner. Mm-hmm. That general contractor should have never been allowed to get [00:34:00] his license back.

Not after six months, not after a fine, not after training. Never. He should have never been allowed to get his license back. No. Because he clearly does not understand how to structurally frame a house. Clearly has some kind of relationship with the la, with the inspections board licensing. Yeah. And should not be allowed to build homes that other people are gonna live in.

So this is a failure. I wanna be clear, this is not only a failure of the licensing board, but it is also a failure of the inspections department.

Jessica: Mm-hmm.

Mikki: So, and I, um. So he did take the contractor to court

Jessica: and he won, but he didn't get any money.

Mikki: Nope. So he,

Jessica: he has not received a single dollar, is

Mikki: Justin.

What is wild is when I, when I was exchanging emails with him, um, and this wasn't the news, so this much like that, the, the, the, I'm gonna find the word. It's, it's here much like the land developer guy in Lincoln County. Mm-hmm. He just didn't respond [00:35:00] to the investigation from the North Carolina Attorney General.

Yeah. This guy kind of did the same thing. So the homeowner sues them. Mm-hmm. The guy just like doesn't participate in the lawsuit. Like he's just like, mm, no. What, who's that? Who, who? I never heard of him. So the judge actually gets pissed and is like, okay, here's the deal. I am holding you in contempt of court and I am going, you are literally gonna have to show up to jail if you don't pay.

It was something like 14,000 and some change for like a very small portion of their attorney's fees and that to date. So they have a 200 and what was it? It was 200 and I think it was 50 or $25,000 was the, the initial judgment that they won. Mm-hmm. At this point with all the interest, because he hasn't made a single payment on that judgment.

It's $270,000 is what, what this guy now owes them. And that's not including the [00:36:00] $15,000 that he got paid.

Jessica: And what's wild is that as soon as this judgment came out, the guy who owns the contracting company went out and got a new LLC.

Mikki: Yep. So he got a new, new LLC, changed his general contracting license to that company so that people couldn't track the judgment.

So that's where we always talk about the importance of researching the actual person. Mm-hmm. Like who's running the company, not just the name of the company. You wanna do a deep dive on that person because they could have like this guy changed their company name, started a new LLC. Yep. And now they're building under a different name.

And you wouldn't necessarily find the judgment for the company. You would find the judgment against the person.

Jessica: Yep. So you, it's they, if they're gonna be bad, they're gonna be sneaky about it. If they're sha sha, 'cause they're going, they're shady. Keep doing it over and over again. And this contractor has allegedly taken out a $75,000 settlement from a framing subcontract subcontractor.

But the [00:37:00] funds were never accounted for.

Mikki: So, yeah. And he, so Jake tells me about this. Mm-hmm. And I thought this was really interesting. He just learned about this recently. So basically what happened was the general contractor sued the framing company that they used to frame the house. The framing company settled and paid the general contractor $75,000.

Jessica: should have gone to Jake.

Mikki: That should have immediately gone to Jake since at the time Jake had a judgment against him. So how this guy's like moving money in a very shady way. Mm-hmm. Like that is currently under investigation, but. On top of the fact that this man built a house that was structurally unsound, that engineers said it would cost upwards of four to $500,000 to fix the house.

That it, they were better off tearing the house down and starting again.

Jessica: I mean, personally, I would rather have the house torn down and start over again. Yeah. Because like I is just this bad juju in that house. Yeah.

Mikki: But like, if that's all the money you [00:38:00] have, like I

Jessica: know that's, I mean, I understand. Yeah, but

Mikki: I'm just

Jessica: saying like, if I had endless funds

Mikki: Yeah.

Endless, endless amounts of money,

Jessica: um, I wouldn't, I mean, I wouldn't wanna live in that house that I had to be afraid of that was going to too tear down and like they had bad luck with insurance too. Yeah. Which is. 'cause you think, okay, well I can't go after the contractor. Well, clearly my homeowner's insurance will cover something, but the homeowner and the contractor had their insurance through Farmer's Bureau, farm Bureau, and so both the claims were denied.

Farm Bureau said the contractors insurance didn't cover poor workmanship or negligence, and Jake's homeowner policy claimed that the house defects were preexisting.

Mikki: I don't even know how that's possible that they're preexisting, but as we know, it's,

Jessica: yeah. So basically the be, I'm, I'm assuming that because the.

They knew that the contractor did crappy work. They can say, oh, this is a, [00:39:00] like, that's

Mikki: their's.

Jessica: Crazy's a crazy thing. Yeah. We're not paying, we're washing our hands of this. And so that's, that's just unfortunate.

Mikki: It is. And I think the, the, the tip for that is if you are in the process of building a home, one of the questions that you need to have for everybody involved is if there is poor workmanship, who is going to pay for it?

If we find that there are structural issues with this house later. Who is there an insurance policy to cover that later?

Jessica: Mm-hmm.

Mikki: My, my insurance isn't, and, and here's the thing. The homeowner, the homeowner's insurance should not be paying for that because eventually that kind of a claim is gonna cost them money.

It's not gonna cost the builder money.

Jessica: Well, I'm sure it was like a last ditch effort 'cause I couldn't get the money from the contractor

Mikki: percent. A hundred percent. But like making sure that your builder has some sort of liability insurance for poor workmanship is extremely important. I have to cover, I have to carry that kind of insurance for my [00:40:00] company.

My general contractors require that I carry insurance for poor workmanship. Mm. Now what's interesting is clearly this builder did require. His subs to have that kind of insurance because he turned around and sued and sued them, sued the framer, and then didn't turn around and pass that money or use that money to fix any of the damages to this guy's house.

He just pocketed the money. So on top of the money he made off of building this guy's house that he couldn't live in, he then made another $75,000 on top of that and walked away with it. And

Jessica: part of me wonders like, why didn't the homeowner sue the framing company as, because that was their subcontractor.

Mikki: I'm assuming because the homeowner wasn't actually under contract with the framing company. The framer was under contract with the general contractor.

Jessica: Okay. I

Mikki: mean, they might have, but obviously that happened before he was ever even involved in that.

Jessica: Yeah. [00:41:00] He had no idea.

Mikki: Yeah.

Jessica: Shady, shady, shady.

Mikki: Shady.

Um, so. Jake tried to involve the licensing board. Um, he says that the communication was minimal. The board initially tried to settle behind closed doors without him present, which is insane to me. And only because local news outlets got involved. Did they agree to actually even have a hearing where he could state, you know, make his complaints and make it clear like everything that happened mm-hmm.

They were just gonna like. Oh yeah, we handled it. No. And he was like, no, I want a public hearing. Absolutely not. And it wasn't until five on your side got involved and this was all over the news that the licensing board was like, okay, we'll, we'll, we'll have a hearing. We'll let you say your piece. Mm. So the contractor ended up paying a fine and he ended up getting his license back, um, even though Jake's judgment still isn't paid.

And I'm like, how in the world is that a thing? Yeah. That the licensing department knows that this guy

Jessica: [00:42:00] owes

Mikki: was found guilty in court of contract violation. He did not build the house that he said he was going to build, and the courts found that he was at fault. My whole thing is like, listen, I get that mistakes can happen, but he should not have been able to get his license back until that judgment was paid.

Jessica: No,

Mikki: absolutely not. Wait,

Jessica: you know what they're probably gonna say is like, oh, but how is he gonna get you the money if he can't work?

Mikki: Sell a kidney. My God. I don't care how you figured. Take out a loan. That's not my problem.

Jessica: McDonald's is usually hiring. I mean, do you want fries with that? Isn't that hard to say?

Mikki: So work there. Here's what, like this part absolutely kills me. And one of the things that I couldn't find, I know that the laws have changed, and it might have been because of this case, but I don't know if it applies for every county. So he tried to sue the license or the um. The inspections department as he should.

Jessica: Right. They

Mikki: failed, then he [00:43:00] paid money for a permit. He paid money for them to inspect it, and they didn't do their job. They over 30 major code violations. Like of course he should be able to sue the inspectors Yes. And the inspections department to help recover those costs. Especially because,

Jessica: especially those emails.

Default_2026-02-09_1: Right.

Jessica: Oh, should we tell him?

Mikki: Especially because they were obviously trying to cover it up. They obviously weren't worried about his safety at all, so

Jessica: annoying.

Mikki: But when they take it to court, um, to sue the county about, about the permits and all that. Mm-hmm. The judge granted governmental immunity, meaning that the co, the county could not be held liable, which is absolutely insane.

Now, I will say, I know of a, a, a general contractor that I've worked with that sued a county. In North Carolina, it wasn't Chatham, but they sued a county, the inspections department. Well, listen, that's a real life choice. Mm-hmm. Like especially for a general contractor, because you are more [00:44:00] than likely going to have to work in that county again.

And I'm gonna not gonna lie to you, it didn't go well for that general contractor, but I do know that it, in certain counties, it is possible. But the fact that they gave this county immunity in blatant disregard for this man's life, like they did not care that that house could have collapsed on his children's heads.

Jessica: So like, where is he living? So like he can't live in his house. What is he doing right now? Like during this whole time, where did

Mikki: he go? That I don't know. Oh,

Jessica: okay.

Mikki: But I do know that they are working on getting the house back, like to livable condition. Mm-hmm. Um, and that, that's crazy. So.

Oh, you talk about the Homeowner recovery fund? Yeah.

Jessica: Because this is

Mikki: a, do we talk about this all the time and now we have more tea?

Jessica: Okay. So there is a homeowner recovery fund, and this is meant to help homeowners who lose different things with their home due to negligent [00:45:00] contractors. So this is why we say you need somebody that's licensed because then you can partake in having money from the fence, having

Mikki: access to the homeowner recovery

Jessica: fund.

Okay. You can't, if they're not licensed, so like. Y yay for him for having a licensed contractor. But however, you don't just get to say, this is how much money I need. The fund only allows you to take 10% of what the fund has. So at the time that Jake was saying that he needed some money, there was $600,000 in the fund, so he could only take 10% of that, which is only $60,000, which sounds like a lot of money, but it didn't cover his attorney fees.

That he was,

Mikki: it didn't even cover. So they were saying that the cost to repair the house would be some, somewhere along the lines of 500, four to $500,000. Mm-hmm. So $60,000 probably wouldn't even have dealt with like the structural framing members. I

Jessica: mean, that's what I mean. You would need to pay a structural engineer to come and tell you all the things that you actually need done.

So there's half of your 60,000,

Mikki: right? Right.

Jessica: [00:46:00] Thousand dollars. And if he accessed the fund. So if he decided to go ahead and take that $60,000, then he gives up his judgment entirely. Meaning that there was no chance of getting money from the contractor and having the contractor be held responsible. So it's like, do I wanna wait for the contractor to pay me the 200 and something thousand dollars or do I wanna just take the $60,000?

Mikki: Which I did neither not know that those two things should not be related.

Jessica: They shouldn't

Mikki: I if I like. So it's almost seems to me like, I'm like, this is a little bit of fraud. The Homeowner Recovery Fund now seems like this is a way to keep you from suing the licensed general contractor. Yeah. Because if they say you have to give up a judgment or you have, like if you do, if you take this money, then you don't have access to, you can't sue the general contractor.

Yeah. That seems like, it's like hush money. It's like, oh, we'll give you this money, but you can't say anything about it and you can't sue anybody and you lose all your legal rights. [00:47:00] Mm-hmm. And I'm like. What

Jessica: it should be and, and, and

Mikki: not,

Jessica: or it should be. And,

Mikki: and the part to me that is just wild is the licensing board is supposed to be protecting the homeowners.

They should be making sure that the general contractors are building things to code. They should't be putting practices into place that protect general contractors. Mm-hmm. If you have done something wrong to the point where a judge, a jury, or whoever mm-hmm is, has determined that you are at fault, that you violated your contract, that you did not build the house that you were supposed to build, why would the licensing board be protecting that?

Get that guy out. You don't want that in your Rolodex of builders who are building here in North Carolina. No. Like let them be part of these jack offs that don't have a license. Let them do whatever they want. You don't want them in your sphere.

Jessica: No. 'cause then you're constantly gonna have to tell 'em like, no, that's not to code.

Mikki: It's, I

Jessica: mean,

Mikki: insane.

Jessica: You actually have to, and like I wonder, did the licensing board, I'm not the licensing board, [00:48:00] did the inspections ever actually go out to the house? Like, it makes me wonder if anybody actually went there to see anything. Because that's a good question. How, how, if it was that bad, how did it pass all those 30 violations?

Like it just makes me think that they're just like, oh, this one.

Mikki: You're good. Keep going. Right? I keep it moving. I think there's a lot there. There was suspicions, and these aren't confirmed, but there was suspicions amongst the construction community that the home builder and the, the inspector were really good friends.

So I think that's part of why the guy was terminated because obviously the inspections department found that this inspector was in clear violation. Violation. They found that his boss who got demoted was in clear violation. Like, and, and so the, it's like the fire marshal mm-hmm. That actually determines like, who, like, who licenses or like, gives permission for inspectors to be inspectors.

They actually refused to reinstate him. So like [00:49:00] somebody somewhere

Jessica: knew,

Mikki: found that the inspector himself was in such blatant violation. How does that not turn around into, okay, we need to make it right with this homeowner. That is the part, to me that is like, it's wild. This is outrageous. And part of like, is like when we shared this story with you, if, if, if you're watching this right now and you're about to build a house, you might be panicked and mm-hmm.

I would be as you should be, right? Because this is the worst case scenario. And when I was talking to Jake, he was like, you know, there is so much building that's happening in Chatham County right now. 'cause Pittsboro is in Chatham County and Pittsboro Village, or Chatham Village is one of these huge neighborhoods that is being, it's a, it's a Disney neighborhood.

Jessica: Oh yeah. Oh, I saw that. I was like,

Mikki: that is in Chatham County. Those are the specs. Oh, I'm not buying those homes. Inspector that are built, that are inspecting the houses, sorry, in Chatham Village. And it's like, he's like, everybody should be scared because if not [00:50:00] only did the inspection department allow this to happen, but then they took absolutely no responsibility for it.

Mm-hmm. When the five on your side team was reaching out to. The inspections department and the licensing board, everybody just passed the buck. They were like, oh, you know, this is a terrible situation, but oh, we are not at fault. So, you know, while we feel bad for the homeowner mm-hmm. You know, it's, it's a lessons learned.

It's, again, it was like that consumer protection, like, you know Yeah. Buyer beware kind of bullshit. And I was just like, this is this man's entire life savings that is gone. He

Jessica: was

Mikki: building

Jessica: his dream

Mikki: home and he, legal recourse. Mm-hmm. He has a judgment. Cannot get the money, like has been trying to get the, the builder to surrender like.

Um, bank documents so they can figure out what assets they can seize. And of course the guy is being shady about it and there's no way to force this guy to do anything. And that, that's

Jessica: so terrible.

Mikki: Is insane. [00:51:00] So, um, go ahead.

Jessica: Um, so after years of experience, Jake's message to homeowners

Mikki: Oh

Jessica: gosh. Is clear.

Mikki: Yeah.

Jessica: Hire a licensed engineer, use strong, use a strong experienced inspector.

Mikki: Yes.

Jessica: At critical points. Don't blindly trust county inspectors to protect you. Mm-hmm. Get a third party. Right. We've seen, you know, and it makes sense because like a lot of contractors are building so many homes, like the builders are doing it.

Yeah. It makes sense that they would know the people that are in those offices and like, not that everybody's gonna be buddy-buddy, but like, oh, especially these smaller counties. And understand that legal victories do not always mean financial recovery, which is sad.

Mikki: Yeah. And that, and that was the thing that Jake said when we were talking was, you know, they have spent on, on top of, you know, everything that they are gonna have to pay to, to fix their house, to make it structurally sound.

So it's livable, which is hundreds of thousands of dollars. They've spent [00:52:00] hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees that they can't recover because it's con, it's not a criminal. Mm-hmm. So if, if it was found to be a criminal situation, they could attempt to recover some of their legal fees, but because it's a contract distribution or.

Dispute dispute. Thank you. You're welcome. Contract dispute that doesn't fall under something that you're, you're allowed to, or you're, you're required to seek your legal fees to be recovered. So all of the money that he spent on engineers and specialists and all of the things, that's money that he's never gonna see again.

And what was so interesting was the end of the, the five on your side interview, they had called, um, I think it's like, it was like Joseph Linley or something, his last name's Linley, but Linley Builders. Mm-hmm. They reached out to him and the guy says to the five on your side chick, he's like, listen, he's being dramatic.

It's not that serious. It's only like $50,000 worth of work that needs to be done. Okay, well, why don't you take the $75,000 you got from the framer and fix his fricking house instead of hiding it [00:53:00] and running like, the level of outrage in this story is fricking wild. And the fact that this guy is just, he's just outta luck.

He's just, it's like, oh, sorry guy. Hope the house doesn't fall on you and your kids and your wife.

Jessica: Right. And then he said that like he, um, as he's been doing this and like. Telling a story. More homeowners. Oh yeah. Who have the same experiences from the same

Mikki: builder

Jessica: and they never pursue them in court.

Probably because it costs you so much money to pursue it in court

Mikki: to nothing, only not get anything back. Even if you have a judgment, if these people are shady ass all get out, they're moving money around and you're never getting your judgment back. You never,

Jessica: so it's just like it's almost not even worth it to go to court, which makes it so that these people can just run amuck.

And they probably know that because they're shady.

Mikki: Yeah. Because they're shady. And that's one of those things where it's like researching people to see what kind of judgments they have against them. Um, I [00:54:00] would go so far as to put in the contract that I'm signing that it, 'cause I have to do this, right?

Like when, for my licensing, for like any kind of loans that I'm getting mm-hmm. For my insurance, for all these things that I have to sign my name on, I have to sign and attest to that. There are no judgements against me in any state or in any country. So what I'm thinking is how can, if you're watching this and you're like, oh crap, I'm about to build a house, you want in your contract that this builder claims or states signs to, it gets a notary.

The whole thing that they have never had a judgments against them. That they have, that none of the members of this, of their company have had a judgment against them, whether it be personal or business under this company's name or any other company's name. Because here's the thing. While that's not going to help [00:55:00] you.

If they actually do have judgements, it's not gonna help you if you have to sue them, because again, we've, as we've learned time and time again, you can't get blood out of a rock. Mm-hmm. Or you can't get money out of a shady human being. It, it becomes an issue of a criminal matter because they lied. So that can change the things that you can recover if they signed an agreement saying, there are no judgments against me, there's no judgments against any, anybody in my company.

I've never had a company that did have judgments against them. I've never had a company that files for, for clo for bankruptcy, or whatever it is. Mm-hmm. And they signed that, and you can prove that that was the case when they signed it. Now they've lied. Now this could potentially be a criminal matter. So I think it's really important for you to make sure that that's one way you cover yourself.

And the other thing that that Jake did talk about was the importance of hiring your own structural engineers to do your inspections. Now listen, that isn't an added expense.

Jessica: Mm-hmm. [00:56:00] It is.

Mikki: But. If you even have a question that the builder that you're working with might not know what they're doing, if, if you had a partial foundation collapse in the middle of your build, maybe it's time to bring out in a third party inspection.

Mm-hmm. And that, that should not be necessary. And I'm gonna go as far as to say is like, I think that's extreme. Like you should not be required to bring in a third party inspection. But if you find yourself in this situation, that's what would've changed the whole game is if somebody else was inspecting that.

Now I do wanna like take, take a minute to say a caveat here. I have worked with inspectors forever. I have never interacted with an inspector that. Was this just shady and blatantly disregard for the safety of, of the occupants? Like [00:57:00] honestly, I've had inspectors that took their job way too seriously. I mean, and, and when you say that, you're like, how can you take the safety of others too seriously?

People can take anything too seriously, just, you know. Search the internet, people can take anything too seriously. So, but I would much rather somebody be taking this it too seriously mm-hmm. Than not seriously enough. So I do wanna caveat that in 20 years I've never come across an inspector that was like, oh, Mickey, I like you, so it's fine that you don't put enough screws in the drywall.

Like, absolutely not. They're like, Hey, I'm make you do better. I'm not passing this until you put more screws in it. That's the way that it should be. Mm-hmm. So I do wanna, I don't wanna like fearmonger to everybody that's watching this, that, oh my God, the inspectors are all, all inspectors are shady. This guy was shady.

He was fired, his boss was demoted. And hopefully a lot of people learned lessons from this. But it does kind of beg the question or [00:58:00] kind of puts it out into the atmosphere. Okay. If you are dealing with the situation and you don't feel like your inspections are, are. Up on the up and up where you don't feel like your builder is on the up and up.

Something to consider is a third party inspector.

Jessica: Yep. Um, yeah, so if you're embarking on a bill, protect yourself early, engineer your plans, understand your permits, verify liability coverage.

Mikki: Yes.

Jessica: And never assume insurance or boards will cover you.

Mikki: And we definitely wanna thank Jake Millback Mach. I, I don't think I said that right.

Sorry Jake. I said your name wrong. We definitely wanna thank him for taking the time to respond to us. Um, it was really cool. Mm-hmm. I'm sure he has a million things going on. Um, and just sending him a. Freaking vibes mm-hmm. To, to, to help with his house. One of the things that he mentioned is that they only installed eight piers in his home, like, which are structural support beams that go on in the basement or the crawl space.

And they're, they have added 23, so that was the, they

Jessica: added 20,

Mikki: [00:59:00] that was the amount of structural support peers that should have been under the house instead of the eight that were actually put under there. So he is actively working to try to make the house safe again and to, to, to stay in that house, and it is just costing him a bajillion gajillion dollars.

And we do not want this to be your home experience. No. Like, building a home is like the American dream, right? Like that is what everybody is, is that's the, I mean, it's even mine room and I build houses so. It is the dream, and we want your experience to be a true dream, not a nightmare. We don't want you to have anything similar to what this poor man and his family have gone through.

Mm-hmm. So if you have had. Please God. It may, may it not be a similar story. Yeah. But if you have your own version of you're never gonna believe what happened, we would love to hear from you. So if you go to chicks in construction.com, we have a form right there on the homepage where you can submit your homeowner horror story.

And honestly, the [01:00:00] more you guys share your stories, the more we are able to share them with our audience so that less people can have the same experience. And I think we all want that for each other. No matter what's happening in the world. If you have had a bad construction experience, like I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy.

So that ability to kind of share your story and for us to share that for you, we would love if you would write in and share your home and our horror stories with us.

Jessica: Yes.

Mikki: So with that being said, my God, today, wow. Mm-hmm. I don't even have words for this story. Like,

Jessica: it's just absolutely insane.

Default_2026-02-09_1: It's

Mikki: horrifying.

It's hard, terrifying. And to think of how much we, how much faith we put in the licensing board, how much faith we put in inspectors. And to find out that not only do some of them not even care, but like, especially in the case of the licensing board, they're just like, well, it's fine. It's fine. We're just gonna give 'em his license back.

And they did the same thing with, with that guy and, well, he [01:01:00] wasn't, I wonder if it was the same licensing board over in Charlotte, like.

Jessica: That'd be different.

Mikki: Okay. So, oh, no, that was the, that was the realtor real estate licensing board. Mm-hmm. Where they, they took, she surrendered her license for, for like three minutes, a mere two years.

Jessica: Oh. It was years.

Mikki: I was like, which, like, at least that was two years. But the fact that she could even get it back after scamming people out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Wow. And it was like, that's okay. Take a break for two years. Maybe learn something or don't like, go on a self journey. Or don't, it's fine.

You can have it back. What?

Jessica: Yeah.

Mikki: What? It's

Jessica: just, it's,

Mikki: there needs to be some permanent consequences if you out here on these streets robbing people blind, you should be in jail. Not only should you lose your license, you should be in jail. I cannot believe some of these stories.

Jessica: No. But also follow us. Yes.

On Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram. We're at Chicks Construction podcast on TikTok. We are at Chickson Construction.

Mikki: Yes. We, we wanna hear from you. Absolutely. Please feel free to share your stories, like, subscribe. [01:02:00] Maybe make a comment. Try to make it nice if you can. You know, if you can't, maybe keep it to yourself.

I don't know. Live your best life. Some of you all are making some really insane comments and I'm wondering if everybody's okay. So we'd love to hear from you if you have something nice to say. If not, maybe go to therapy. I don't know. Anyway, love you guys. We'll see you next time. Bye bye.

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