Builder of the Year or Disaster of the Decade? A Homeowner's Horror Story

Builder of the Year Disaster: Homeowner Horror Story

In this episode of Chicks in Construction, hosts Mikki Paradis and Jessica Abreu dive into a startling homeowner horror story involving an award-winning 'Builder of the Year' who quickly turns into the 'Bumbler of the Decade.' From demolished heirloom gardens to an open house during a storm, the mishaps are beyond what any homeowner should endure. The episode also explores the importance of solid contracts, correct supervision, and clear communication in construction projects. Additionally, Mikki and Jessica add a light-hearted segment with a taste test of Shameless Snacks. Tune in for valuable construction insights, homeowner tips, and some much-needed laughs!

00:00 Builder of the Year Disaster

01:05 Meet the Hosts

01:32 New Year, New Us

01:55 Snack Time: Shameless Snacks Review

05:41 Book Recommendations

11:01 Homeowner Horror Story: The Builder of the Year

24:47 Communication Breakdown with Contractors

26:03 Permit Issues and Project Mismanagement

27:02 Emotional and Physical Damages

29:20 Insurance and Accountability

35:16 Contractual Obligations and Compensation

43:16 Ensuring Proper Supervision

52:16 Final Thoughts and Viewer Engagement

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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/

27 Chicks in Construction - Homeowner Horror Story
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So imagine this, you hire the builder of the year, you're thinking finally someone who knows what they're doing.

[00:00:18] Mickey: Yeah. Spoiler alert, he did not know what he was doing.

[00:00:22] Jess: Nope. And said our homeowner watched on their ring camera as this award-winning contractor went full Godzilla trampling through Mcgras Heirloom Garden like it was a parking lot.

[00:00:33] Mickey: Oh, and it gets better. Then he left the house wide open before a storm hit. Rained straight into the living room, right into custom made bookshelves made by their father, who just so happened to have passed away

[00:00:46] Jess: fairly Heirlooms turned into warped particle Board

[00:00:50] Mickey: builder of the year, more like Bumbler

[00:00:53] Jess: of the decade.

This is chicks and constructions where we talk about what happens when dream builds. Meet, demolition, derby.

Well, hello and welcome back to another episode of The Chicks in Construction.

[00:01:09] Mickey: I am your host, Mickey Paradise, and this is my amazing co-host.

[00:01:12] Jess: Hi, I am Jessica Abram.

[00:01:14] Mickey: And listen, I'm just gonna tell you guys tell you the truth 'cause I think that's important. Last episode we recorded I did have a, a TV here that I could just look at myself the entire time and Joe did take that away.

So, so now we're making direct eye contact again, and You're welcome. So listen. It's the new year, new us season two chicks in construction. We here for it. Love it. Boom. But, but here's the thing. We all know that there's a lot of New Year's resolutions that are happening right now. All the resolutions, and we as the chicks in construction, we wanna help you out.

I, I will tell you guys, I just, I just dropped this on Jess just now. She was, she just showed up and I was like, Hey, we're doing this thing. So listen. I like, I like a snack moment. I'm here for. And also, this is not sponsored I, but, but please shameless snacks. If you'd like to or

[00:02:02] Jess: shamelessly talking about shameless

[00:02:04] Mickey: snacks, please, please sponsor us.

But this is not sponsored, but I, um. I love candy. It's a problem. I, because like, 'cause I'm not supposed to be eating sugar. I was supposed to be limiting my sugar and gluten isn't everything and so it's really hard to find gluten-free candy. Mm-hmm. Um,

[00:02:21] Jess: especially, do you like the gummy stuff?

[00:02:23] Mickey: Yes. Mm. And that it always has gluten 'cause like, isn't gelatin.

Do they have gluten in it? I don't know. I don't know. I just made that up. No,

[00:02:30] Jess: but it's in a lot of the stuff. It's literally everywhere.

[00:02:33] Mickey: It's

[00:02:33] Jess: everywhere. It is like

[00:02:34] Mickey: dry dust. It gets everywhere. So see how I tied that in, guys? So I found shameless snacks and it is gluten-free vegan, and it has dietary a good source of dietary fiber because we all know.

We need more fiber in our lives. So what I was thinking, I've already tried some of these, but Jess is gonna get it on the mix. Um, I'm

[00:02:56] Jess: a

[00:02:56] Mickey: little, we're gonna try them on on air an A SMR moment. Ah, oh my god. These smell so good. Try them.

[00:03:05] Jess: Okay, so

[00:03:05] Mickey: that is

[00:03:06] Jess: the peach. What flavor is it? Ones ew peach.

[00:03:08] Mickey: Oh, do you hate peach?

Here, try this, try try the berry then.

[00:03:12] Jess: Okay, so this is, I'm sorry. I'm terrible

[00:03:13] Mickey: now. The peach smell great. I love peach. I love peach. Um, so I, yeah,

[00:03:19] Jess: very

[00:03:19] Mickey: small. Yeah. Yeah. So you guys, these are so good. It has three grams of sugar, 70 calories.

[00:03:26] Jess: It's cute and a little bear.

[00:03:27] Mickey: It's like a little gummy bear. I'm telling you.

They're non GMO gluten free. Are they like the look on Jess's face is suggesting she's not a fan. I'm a fan. Anyway.

[00:03:43] Jess: It tastes really good.

[00:03:45] Mickey: But, but the texture is, is off for

[00:03:49] Jess: me.

[00:03:49] Mickey: When was the last time you had like a regular gummy bear?

[00:03:52] Jess: I know

[00:03:53] Mickey: Halloween,

[00:03:55] Jess: I don't remember, but I like,

[00:03:58] Mickey: no,

[00:04:00] Jess: let me try a peach one just for Liz.

I feel like it can't be any worse.

[00:04:03] Mickey: Well,

[00:04:04] Jess: if you hate peach, it is very peachy. Are these, oh, these aren't little bears. They're little hearts.

[00:04:10] Mickey: No, yeah, they're little hearts. Very cute. We're getting live, live polling right now from Jess. It's a No, it's an absolute no. Joe is laughing at us. He's like, whatcha guys doing?

This is a podcast about construction. We're trying to help you guys out, but Jess says, no,

[00:04:31] Jess: the texture is better on these

[00:04:32] Mickey: right.

[00:04:35] Jess: I just don't like peach, anything so

[00:04:37] Mickey: much fair.

[00:04:38] Jess: But

[00:04:38] Mickey: I love a peach moment.

[00:04:39] Jess: I want this

[00:04:42] Mickey: shameless snacks. If you're watching

[00:04:44] Jess: this texture

[00:04:45] Mickey: in that flavor,

[00:04:46] Jess: this flavor,

[00:04:47] Mickey: they do have a crap ton of flavors.

So I did buy like the sample pack of all the flavors. Mm-hmm. So I have options. Um, so far I've tried the watermelon, which is pretty tasty. And then they have like a Coca-Cola one, this like, you remember those old Coca-Cola like flavored? Treats that were like in the shape bottles of the Coke. Bottle bottle.

Yes. Yes. So they have those. Those are pretty good. Listen, are they the same as eating?

[00:05:12] Jess: No.

[00:05:12] Mickey: A gummy bear, they're not. But they have three grams of sugar in the entire bag. Mm-hmm. So you gotta take the win where you can find the win. That's

[00:05:19] Jess: isn't the flavor. Both of them is fine. It's, I'm a texture. I'm weird about that though.

I don't

[00:05:24] Mickey: even True too. But for some reason that one doesn't bother me.

[00:05:27] Jess: Do you like jelly beans?

[00:05:28] Mickey: I do,

[00:05:29] Jess: I do not because of the texture of them.

[00:05:31] Mickey: Oh, interesting.

[00:05:32] Jess: Because I,

[00:05:32] Mickey: people are wild.

[00:05:33] Jess: Yeah. You know,

[00:05:35] Mickey: so listen with that note.

[00:05:37] Jess: Hmm.

[00:05:37] Mickey: People being wild,

[00:05:39] Jess: moving on,

[00:05:39] Mickey: moving on. Um, I, we're starting, you know, new year, new you.

[00:05:44] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:05:46] Mickey: New Year, new me is what I'm shooting for. I have been reading two books simultaneously. I don't know what this is, but we're doing it. It's like Zen. I'm Zening. You're Zening books. I'm Zening Books. My two books. Books. Okay. Two books. What are we

[00:05:58] Jess: reading?

[00:05:59] Mickey: Okay. So I'm pairing my, one of my all time favorite authors ever is Gregory Boyle.

He's a Jesuit priest based outta Los Angeles. He started the largest gang intervention and reintegration program in the world called Homeboy Industries. Okay. Listen, all of his books are fire a hundred percent, like they're so good. His latest book. Um, of course my mind is gonna be like, what's the book called?

Cherished Belongings. Thank you. It came back to me, is so good. It is so good. So like it helps me, like when I'm getting really mad about shenanigans happening mm-hmm. Just to realize like, not everybody's bad. They just make interesting life choices.

[00:06:38] Jess: Interesting Life

[00:06:39] Mickey: choices, right. Interesting life choices that I don't necessarily support, but it doesn't make them bad people.

'cause I will immediately get into the space of like, you're a horrible human being. That's not, it's not super helpful. It's not super helpful. But I'm pairing that with the Let Them Theory.

[00:06:52] Jess: That's what I'm reading. I was like, oh,

[00:06:55] Mickey: oh, that sounds like fire's.

[00:06:56] Jess: It's, it's isn't, it's amazing. It's

[00:06:58] Mickey: so, it's like the Let let them, but then also let me.

Mm-hmm. And I was just like, oh my gosh.

[00:07:03] Default_2025-11-12_1: I

[00:07:03] Jess: love it

[00:07:03] Mickey: because listen, I've been, , I've been popping off in these streets lately. I've been I've been losing my mind a little bit. I was on a job site the other day and this guy cut a bunch of holes in like a two hour rated fire rated ceiling, which is.

Very big deal. 'cause it's three layers of drywall, plus a layer of RC one channel.

[00:07:22] Jess: And he cut holes just for no

[00:07:25] Mickey: reason. Yeah. He like, honestly, it looked like somebody had let, like locked a beaver in the room and the beaver was trying desperately to get out through the ceiling and he just went, ha ha ha ha.

And it was like eating it. It was real bad. I really hope that there's a beaver on this. I, we have Joe make a put a beaver.

[00:07:43] Jess: He's like, oh, I'm getting a beaver.

[00:07:45] Mickey: So I, um, I wasn't my most professional moment and I, I called him all the way out in the meeting and I was just like, pretend like you have common sense.

It didn't go well. So, working,

[00:08:01] Jess: did he pretend like he had common sense or did he lose his mind too?

[00:08:04] Mickey: It was, I, I would say, I think I scared him a little bit. And he just went quiet. He went silent.

[00:08:11] Jess: Am I gonna,

[00:08:12] Mickey: he was like, Ooh, she seems unstable. Let me not,

[00:08:16] Jess: I don't know if she's carrying or not, so I'm just gonna be over here in the corner

[00:08:20] Mickey: percent.

He was sitting real quiet. He was worried about his life, which honestly in that moment I could feel my heart beating in the vein in my forehead. Oh yeah. Yeah. He probably was smart to just be quiet. 'cause I don't know. I was about to Hulk out. Might have.

[00:08:32] Jess: Seen that

[00:08:33] Mickey: vein. Yeah. Yeah. He probably saw the vein and was like, oh God, what is that?

And I was like, it's rage. It's just pure rage coursing through my body right now.

[00:08:40] Jess: Mm.

[00:08:41] Mickey: So I'm really trying to just be like, let them cut holes in the ceiling, NAMA stage, like an idiot.

[00:08:50] Jess: Let

[00:08:50] Mickey: them be

[00:08:51] Jess: stupid

[00:08:51] Mickey: is I'm not, I was just like, oh, what's happening right now you guys? I'm not sure. I'm not sure. So it's, it's an interesting time to be alive.

I'm working, I'm trying to just be like, Hmm, what would G Dog say? That's what they call Gregory Boyle. They call him G Dog, like all the guys that work at Homeboy Industries, and I'm just like, what would G Dog do? Oh my gosh, he probably wouldn't. Scream at someone in a meeting. I wouldn't say I was screaming.

It was like scream adjacent. It was projecting with my diaphragm.

[00:09:22] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:09:22] Mickey: But I was

[00:09:22] Jess: also, the words coming out though were

[00:09:25] Mickey: like super spicy. They were, oh, they were spicy. I was disgusted. Um, you know, so I'm working on that new, new year, new me guys, new year, new me. I'm trying to be less of a salty, salty lady of a very spicy contractor.

[00:09:40] Jess: Mm-hmm. Take it down a notch.

[00:09:41] Mickey: And, you know, I'm just trying, just, just because like the, the amount of like unchecked stress in my body from letting everything drive me crazy is like this. Can't be good.

[00:09:51] Jess: It's not good for you. It's

[00:09:52] Mickey: not,

[00:09:52] Jess: stress is not good for your body.

[00:09:54] Mickey: No, it's not. It's not. And that is, in the book, they talk about that in let the, let them theory about like how when we allow other people to kind of hijack the emotions and the stress and let it just take over fully.

Mm-hmm. It's not good for us. So. I highly recommend those books. Obviously Jess is already onto the one, but I am cherished belongings by Gregory Boyle. It's straight Fire, but I'm gonna say all of his books are, so he's, I think his first one was Tattoos on the Heart. The second one was Barking to the Choir.

The third one was The Whole Language, which was my first book that I read by by him. Oh my God, I've probably read it a hundred times and then Cherish Belongings. Big fan. Big fan. If G Dog ever wants to come on the show. I don't think we're a big enough deal, but maybe one day we would host G Dog. He has nothing to do with construction.

[00:10:44] Jess: We'll let him male or still,

[00:10:46] Mickey: and he's not a chick, but we would a big guy. We would make all the exceptions for G Dog. I

[00:10:51] Jess: love it.

[00:10:53] Mickey: Gee dog. Have your people call my people. I don't have people. Just in case you weren't because you weren't sure. Me. We don't have people. Me just, just call me. Just call Jess. Call anybody.

Okay. So today we're gonna do a little homeowner horror story. We're gonna do it a little differently 'cause it wasn't somebody that wrote in. So I am gonna get to tell the story this time because somebody reached out and asked. Um, me to do a little consulting work for them, which happens every like two years.

It's not very common, but when it does, I'm always like, Ooh, construction drama, I'm here for it. Yeah, a hundred percent.

[00:11:25] Jess: Spill the tea,

[00:11:26] Mickey: spill it. So I get to like, investigate and, um, my god, today. So here's a really to start the story off with. One of the reasons why this person chose the builder was because they won.

The Builder of the Year award,

[00:11:45] Jess: how do you win the builder of the year award?

[00:11:47] Mickey: I don't know. Okay. I, I think people vote, but also I think it's one of those things where like, they kind of take a lot of factors into, into, into consideration, but I think much like how some people trust a review

[00:12:02] Jess: mm-hmm.

[00:12:03] Mickey: They consider this like, or, or, or not even necessarily a review, like.

I don't know. There's a lot of beauty awards, like the whatever. Mm-hmm. Beauty award. Oh, well it got the beauty award, so it must be really good. So I think it kind of falls in this category of Oh, if they won the builder of the year award. Yeah. Was

[00:12:19] Jess: it like locally?

[00:12:20] Mickey: It was locally. Okay. So I don't wanna say which county 'cause they break it up by county here.

[00:12:24] Jess: Okay.

[00:12:24] Mickey: Like when they get give the award. I don't wanna say which county. 'cause then y'all just able to literally look up who it is. I mean Google.

[00:12:30] Jess: You can Google all the counties. Message

[00:12:32] Mickey: me if you want. If it's one of those I do love, spill some tea. Okay, so sorry. So there's a, it was a huge reason as to why they picked this builder.

Mm-hmm. 'cause they got multiple quotes I was really happy to hear.

[00:12:45] Jess: Right.

[00:12:45] Mickey: They got multiple quotes and I was like, get it. It wasn't the highest, but it wasn't the lowest. Good. So they not only did they fall within like the mid range of the pricing. But they, um, they had had this builder of the weird year distinguishment, distinguishment.

Do we feel like that's a word? Might not be. Anyway, it's

[00:13:02] Jess: now,

[00:13:03] Mickey: it is now put, put it in the, put it in the dictionary folks. So they felt like, ah, builder of the year, they must be trustworthy. Mm-hmm. But here's, here's my warning to this. Obviously if you won builder of the weird year, the weir builder of the weir, we're winning today and we are doing the Lord's work today.

It it means that you, at some point, were doing things really well and that's great. What I've noticed is if you're a, if they're a smaller company, the builder of the year award opens them up to having access to a lot more work. And if they don't have the infrastructure in place within their company to be able to take on all that work.

Yep. And they don't understand the importance of saying no to things. Mm. All of a sudden they have way more work than they can handle. And what was gonna take three months is gonna take six months to a year. Because they have too much work, they're spread too thin. They're taking all these projects that they don't have the time or space or resources

[00:14:07] Jess: to do.

Yeah. And they're probably getting subcontractors that aren't like the highest quality. Yeah. 'cause they're like, oh, I just need, I just need a body there to go work.

[00:14:14] Mickey: Yeah. And so. So she, she kinda reaches out to me and she's like, okay, so the story starts like this. And I'm like, tell me everything. Like spare no expenses, tell me everything.

So they are doing a kitchen and bathroom renovation.

[00:14:30] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:14:31] Mickey: And some, some mild, some light outside work, like they're gonna read you their deck.

[00:14:37] Jess: Okay.

[00:14:37] Mickey: Um. And there was a couple of pieces of siding on their house that needed to be replaced, so they were gonna do that and get it painted. So the outside work was not extensive, but one of the things that she told me straight out the gate was.

We, we were very specific on the types of materials, especially for the outside of the house that we wanted to use. So in the decking world, there's a product called T Trex. I don't know if you've heard of T

[00:15:01] Jess: Trex. Ooh, yeah. It's like the kind of like plastic, it's a plastic

[00:15:03] Mickey: composite. Yeah. Yeah. So it's not wood, which is awesome because it lasts forever.

If it's installed properly, it will last forever. It has a, they have a really great warranty pro like process. So as long as it's installed by an installer that's like. Got a relationship with trucks that they've been trained with, with how their install system goes. Your deck essentially is warrantied for the lifetime long time mm-hmm.

Of the home, which is awesome. 'cause, you know, decks, I don't know how many times we're gonna have to replace our deck. Like, but we, we tried real hard not to, like, we like, would take the boards up as they would like start to rot and it was like, okay, we're gonna have to replace the deck. So Trex is a really awesome product.

I, I'm a big fan. So, and they, when they said to them, like, this was in the process of getting quotes, they said, this is the product that we wanna use. Right? So when they got the over $200,000 estimate, they assumed because they told them which product they wanted them to quote that

[00:16:01] Jess: they

[00:16:01] Mickey: had, that it had the trax in it.

[00:16:04] Jess: It didn't.

[00:16:04] Mickey: It didn't. So that literally raised the price of the deck by $30,000.

[00:16:10] Jess: Yeah. Because it's so much more expensive than the wood.

[00:16:12] Mickey: And it was one of those things where it wasn't until the product, like the wood that they were going to replace the deck with was delivered that they realized that they didn't quote it with tracks.

So they, the wood gets delivered, the homeowner calls the builder and is like, whoa. This isn't Treks. Like they didn't even go through the process 'cause there's like a million different colors. Mm-hmm. So they didn't go through the process of picking out the color, which she kind of thought was weird. And she was like, that's strange.

Yeah. Why? Like, why, why didn't we get to pick out the color?

[00:16:41] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:16:42] Mickey: And then order it and have it delivered because they were just gonna do, do the wood and then stain it and they would figure out the stain color later. And she was like, no, no, no. Like that's not what. We, we talked about, so the builder's like, oh, well we quoted it as wood, so in order for you to have Trex, you're gonna have to pay more.

And she's like, okay, well how much more? And he's like $30,000, which I do know the Trex is spicy priced

[00:17:07] Jess: right.

[00:17:08] Mickey: And it was a medium. Medium to large-ish deck. Mm-hmm. But it wasn't like this, like four tiered wild deck, you know, like that you see in the movies. Yeah. Like it was a deck, it was a regular deck.

So a $30,000 price increase was like questionable.

[00:17:26] Jess: Right.

[00:17:26] Mickey: It, it didn't make a whole lot of sense like that. Straight out the gate was like, okay, weird. So the immediately their renovation goes from 200,000 to 230,000, just like straight out the gate. And I, to me, you know,

[00:17:37] Jess: and I'm like, it, that doesn't seem right because you were to think that the wood cost a certain amount of money.

Right?

[00:17:42] Mickey: Right. So what's

[00:17:43] Jess: that's gotta go back towards

[00:17:46] Mickey: and yeah. So we start out just wrong foot, like started out in the wrong foot.

[00:17:51] Jess: So what's. So to prevent that from happening to someone? Yeah. When they're looking at their quote, they should make sure that all of the materials that they want.

[00:18:02] Mickey: Yeah.

Especially if, you know, going in what the materials you're, you are expecting to be in there are

[00:18:09] Jess: mm-hmm.

[00:18:10] Mickey: In, in the spec sheet. I think the issue is that they did not initially provide all of that. So they had a contract, it wasn't super specific. Mm-hmm. And this is where, mm-hmm. Being as specific as you can and encouraging your general contractor, or let's just be honest, demanding.

Mm-hmm. That your general contractor is extremely specific in the estimate and the contract is really, really important. Yeah know like when you read through it and it says decking.

[00:18:37] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:18:38] Mickey: And you know you want treks, go back to the general contractor before you sign anything and say. No. Can you put in that this is Trek so that they know your expectation is, is this is Tex.

Right. And if they don't catch it on their end, well, we are under contract. 'cause like, you know how it goes. Yeah. It's gonna be on them.

[00:18:56] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:18:57] Mickey: It, it's gonna be on the homeowner.

[00:18:59] Jess: Like if it said it, then if it was going to be 30,000 more, then you have the option at that point to be like, oh no, maybe I don't really want that.

[00:19:07] Mickey: Yeah. I mean, I feel like the, for like, for me, this was a like a, like a big conflict of like, how do I advise them? Like at the end of the day, they were under the impression that that $200,000 included the Trex. Mm-hmm. And they went with this builder because other builders mm-hmm. Had it included in their price and they were higher.

Now we don't know if the lower bids, but like in their mind, this is the most amount of money that I'm going to spend. Right. And then you come back and you're like, oh no, whoops. We forgot that. Mm-hmm. I think that's, it kind of gives to me like either you really don't know what you're doing, you're not paying attention, or they were intentionally going, coming in low so that they can add the price in later.

Mm-hmm. Which happens all the time. It happens all the time. So. Straight out the gate, they're kind of just like, wow. So now this is costing us an another $30,000. Mm-hmm. And as we've learned, prices for renovations are really wild. Like me and Jess are just kinda like, what, for $230,000, I could literally build you a house and I could,

[00:20:15] Jess: I could go buy a house.

[00:20:17] Mickey: I don't know where, but we could do it.

[00:20:19] Jess: Nice little double wide

[00:20:22] Mickey: facts. Little double wide trailer. Unless we could build a real nice trailer. I'm not, I'm just saying. I've seen these tiny houses people are coming up with.

[00:20:29] Jess: Oh, they're so cute.

[00:20:30] Mickey: I'm a fan. So, so that's like. First issue. Okay. And immediately I'm just like, okay.

So I'm like, tell me more. Tell me more. Mm-hmm. So one of the big issues mm-hmm. Was in multiple times she had conversations with this builder. She told them that her mother who has passed. Planted these, I guess they're perennials. Is that the word for plants that can like grow, grew every year,

[00:20:59] Jess: year? Yes.

[00:21:00] Mickey: So her mother, when she was alive, had planted these bulbs in the front of like where the deck, the existing deck was.

[00:21:08] Jess: Okay.

[00:21:08] Mickey: And she said, listen, are you guys going to. Um, give me a heads up so that I can either protect the plants or dig them up because they're really important to me.

[00:21:21] Jess: Oh, no.

[00:21:22] Mickey: Yeah. You know exactly where this is going. Oh,

[00:21:24] Jess: no.

[00:21:24] Mickey: So she goes to the beach and looks on her ring camera and they're literally hacking her plants up.

Digging them outta the ground and threw them all in the trash. Part of the problem with this entire homeowner horror story is that this, you know, best in show, if you will, builder didn't have any supervision on the job, pretty much from the start to finish. This homeowner was managing the job, letting them know when things were delivered.

They weren't even aware, like she told me this story where they had some product delivered and she reaches out to the builder and she was like, are you guys ever gonna start? And he's like, well, we're waiting for the materials to be delivered. And she's like, they've been in my garage for two weeks. Like the,

[00:22:11] Jess: how, how

[00:22:11] Mickey: do you

[00:22:11] Jess: not

[00:22:12] Mickey: know has absolutely no idea what's happening.

And like, I think, like from the research that I did, they took on way too many projects. Mm-hmm. They got, they won this award. Everybody was reaching out to them because, and

[00:22:23] Jess: they just saw dollar signs.

[00:22:25] Mickey: Yeah. And they saw the dollar signs. They didn't, they didn't. Consider the reason that they won this award is because they worked really hard to have this really good reputation where people would nominate them for this award where people would encourage mm-hmm.

Them to receive the award and now they've undo done all of that by taking on all of this work. 'cause you know, cha ching, cha ching, cha ching, money, money, money. And I'm like, listen, I mean, I, I understand money. I wanna be rich. Please like, and subscribe so that I can be, but. There's a point where like you have to, like in, in my business, we don't take on more work than we can feasibly do all be a part of doing because my reputation really matters to me.

I want, I don't wanna stretch my guys too thin. I don't want them to be on more projects that they can handle. I don't want. Us to not be able to give every one of our clients the same amount of attention. Mm-hmm. No matter what. So like we will often turn down work because I know how much our guys can handle every year.

And so. It's a hard decision because like, let's be honest, I'm probably not gonna own a private jet or a private island in my life. Not unless

[00:23:34] Jess: you like and subscribe.

[00:23:35] Mickey: Not unless you like and subscribe, please. Thank you. Um, it's free. It's free. It's free for you and it helps me make money so I can be a stay at home dog.

Mom, come on. Don't you want that for me? Everybody's like, absolutely not, which is fair. So. I think they just took on way too much work. They didn't have the staffing, and this homeowner is paying $230,000 to essentially be the project manager on her own project.

[00:24:01] Jess: Terrible,

[00:24:02] Mickey: terrible. So she looks in her ring camera.

Did

[00:24:05] Jess: any of the plants survive?

[00:24:06] Mickey: No. No. And like the issue with that is it's a, it's a, it's a value that is. Untangible. Mm-hmm. Like the, the value of, you know, having something that, that your mother who has since passed in your yard, that she planted herself. And to be able to look at those things every season when they come up and just feel that connect.

Like, how do you put a price on that?

[00:24:32] Jess: You do not.

[00:24:33] Mickey: You don't. And so it gets worse. It gets worse, like, oh no. And this was kind of the theme of the whole story. Mm-hmm. Like the theme of the whole story was. They had no idea what was going on in our project. When I read, reach out to them and tell them, ask them when things were gonna start or when, you know, what the process was, or the progress we were making was nine times outta 10, they didn't even know that the materials had been delivered or that we were ready.

Mm-hmm. And it was just, she was constantly reaching out to the general contractor. So. There was like multiple people within the company. Only one of them was obviously the licensed gc, but they had project managers and she was mostly dealing with the project manager. And I thought this was a very interesting tidbit and , I did see some of the text messages. Obvi. I wasn't there for all of the conversations, but. The person that this guy hired, this licensed general contractor hired. Had no skin in the game in the sense of like, it wasn't his license that he was gonna lose, it was this other guys.

[00:25:34] Jess: Right.

[00:25:34] Mickey: So whenever she would reach out to him, he would be really disrespectful. He would be very dismissive of her. Um, and he was in a large way, part of the problem. So he wasn't communicating, he wasn't aware of what was happening. And this general contractor was expecting, you know, was, was entrusting this guy mm-hmm.

To handle it, which. I dunno what the fix for that is. Like a large general contracting company or a medium sized general contracting company, you're probably not going to be dealing with in all aspects. The actual license gc, obviously they have a L, like we have a legal responsibility mm-hmm To make sure that we're aware of what's happening on the projects that are license is being pulled.

To do, to permit. Mm-hmm. And I will say on the plus side, she did not have any problems with them being permit licensed. Permit with them pulling permits. Mm-hmm. They were pulling permits the entire time. So that was like, plus they weren't trying to pull that like, oh no, we don't need permits. Um, part of it, and I, because that was like one of the second questions I asked her husband works in the permitting department.

And so these people came into it knowing that he, that was not something that they were gonna be able to get away with not getting permits. 'cause her husband was there, works in the permitting department. Mm-hmm. So I don't know if that was a piece of it smartly, they did pull all the permits. That wasn't a problem.

So there's like, that's a plus. Yeah. We're here for that. But, um, the managing of the job was. Kind of wild. So when she sees that they have pulled up all of all of her plants that were planted by her mother and that they've been destroyed, she was really upset.

[00:27:10] Jess: I mean, I cried.

[00:27:11] Mickey: Yeah, no, she was, she was really devastated.

Um, and went to the GC and they, you know, they were sorry, but. What is sorry gonna do? When she, it was like she told them multiple times about this. It wasn't like she mentioned in passing. Mm-hmm. Before they started multiple times, many conversations when the actual correct decking was delivered. Hey, remember we got it.

We got it, we got it. Just kind of dismissing her concerns. And then she goes outta town, she didn't even know they were going to start, so they came to like demo the deck. And when they did, they just took everything out, like machete style, like just cha cha cha cha. And I'm just like, Ooh. Ooh. So when she approaches the builder, the builder does, they, their response to everything that they messed up is, oh, don't worry.

We're gonna do something really nice for you at the end. And I was like, I'm what? Like.

[00:28:03] Jess: We're gonna do something really nice for you, like, give me my money back.

[00:28:06] Mickey: Right. So that's, that is where my mind went. I was like, for your idea of Nice. And my idea of NICE might be very different.

[00:28:14] Jess: Yes. So what is the nice thing?

[00:28:17] Mickey: Well, we have, we never even got there because she kinda reached out to me to be like, what do I do? And I was like, no, you want compensation monetarily? Mm-hmm. So the first thing we did was we read her entire contract to see what kind of language they had for. Things like this. And there wasn't anything that covered how they would handle mistakes to this level.

Um, unfortunately it kept continuing on. So they, the siding that they had to replace is like, there was a couple of pieces of siding that were kind of rotted out,

[00:28:47] Jess: right?

[00:28:48] Mickey: So they come on a Friday to demo. And it was, it was like subsiding. And then they realized as they were then there, there were some soffit.

So like the soffit is like the underside of your roof. Um, and a lot of times it can be hardy board, it can be a plastic material. Hers was wood. And so they re, they removed it 'cause it needed to be replaced.

[00:29:10] Jess: Okay.

[00:29:10] Mickey: And then left for the weekend. They didn't cover anything with a tarp. They didn't cover anything with plastic.

They didn't protect. The the areas that they ripped the siding off at all, and then it rained all weekend. Yeah.

[00:29:27] Jess: Hmm.

[00:29:28] Mickey: Yeah.

[00:29:29] Jess: So water got

[00:29:30] Mickey: oh,

[00:29:31] Jess: everywhere.

[00:29:31] Mickey: Everywhere. And here's where it's like this, it's, it sounds like I'm making this up, but, so apparently her husband's father who has since passed, it's not funny, but I'm laughing because I'm, I stress response, laugh at inappropriate times.

Um, before he passed away, when they were building the house, he built these built in custom wood. Bookshelves that just so happened to be, to be

[00:29:58] Jess: on the same,

[00:29:58] Mickey: on the wall where they removed the siding and they were destroyed.

[00:30:03] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:30:04] Mickey: So the water intrusion was so severe that the entire ceiling of the room that the siding was removed on had to be completely torn down, like it fell in places and they had to end up just taking out the entire ceiling.

All the insulation, all the, the wall, the exterior wall, holy mo, where the bookshelves. Were built,

[00:30:25] Jess: of course.

[00:30:26] Mickey: And they, because they were custom built, it wasn't like it could just be moved. Like they had to be deconstructed. The wood was really wet, it was really warped. It was not salvageable. Oh my God. And so that was when she reached out to me.

'cause it was just like, I don't know what to do in this situation. And when she reached, when, when she was irate and was like, what is, what is wrong with you all? All they said to her was, oh, well don't worry. We're gonna take care of you in the end. We're gonna do something really nice.

[00:30:53] Jess: But like you're ruining her whole house.

[00:30:56] Mickey: Right? Like, you've now destroyed two things, two irreplaceable things.

[00:31:02] Jess: And the her, I mean that whole side, right? Like now you take off all the siding.

[00:31:06] Default_2025-11-12_1: Right?

[00:31:07] Mickey: Right. So they had to take out a good amount of the siding. Mm-hmm. They had to take, they had to completely, um, like. Got that entire room, which that room wasn't a part of the renovation.

So now, so

[00:31:19] Jess: I hope it's not being added to the cost.

[00:31:21] Mickey: Well, so they tried and I was like, absolutely not. So then they tried, they tried to say, okay, here's the cost, and she was, she was like, no, think you should, I'm sorry, should send this to the subcontractor that you brought out that didn't care enough about my house to put some tarp up over the areas of siding and soffit that they just ripped.

Off and then left. Um, so she, she had enough, like absolutely not in her to be like, no, we won't. So then they tried to file a claim on her insurance. They tried, the general contractor, tried to have her homeowner's insurance pay for the mistake and didn't even tell her, didn't even tell her about it. She just got a call from her insurance company saying, Hey, is that

[00:32:05] Jess: legal?

[00:32:07] Mickey: I'm not a hundred percent sure. I didn't, I wasn't able to talk to her insurance adjuster. But she gets a call from her insurance company saying, Hey, um, we're a little confused. This company is trying to file a claim against your homeowner's insurance, but it sounds to us like it is a claim that should be being made against their general liability insurance.

[00:32:30] Jess: Right.

[00:32:31] Mickey: And she was like, absolutely not. They are not to make, and like this claim should be denied and like had to like the amount of paperwork. Yeah. Just wild. So not only is. Her or her plants ruined Are, are, is her the bookshelf built by her father-in-law who has passed ruined, but then she's having to defend that these are not legitimate claims on her homeowner's insurance.

Right.

[00:32:54] Jess: Because the home, your homeowner's insurance will go up every single time. A hundred make a claim.

[00:32:59] Mickey: Yeah. Especially with the water intrusion claim. Like they, like when I think I told the story once before that when I was renting, Ugh, listen, I know these people don't watch the pod, but my god today.

Worst landlords ever. Um, the husband tried to. Fix a leak. We had a leaky faucet. That was all it was on the second floor. It was a little townhouse. Oh, yes, I remember. And he flooded the entire second floor, which caused the entire first floor. We had to stay in hotels, there was damage to our furniture. And we ended up having to file a claim against our renter's insurance because they weren't gonna cover any of that.

And when we bought our house. The fact that we had a water intrusion claim was a huge deal, and we had to explain it like in ad nauseum. So like a, a water intrusion claim is a big deal, a really big deal. It's bigger than like, oh, a tree fell in my yard. It's a very big deal. So she was like, absolutely not.

So she goes back to the builder. Well, it technically it's not the license gc, it's this person this that's in charge of her project. And she was like, I don't even wanna talk to you anymore. I wanna speak to the licensed general contractor. Mm-hmm. The person whose name is on the line, he comes out, he sees everything, and he just throws this other guy all the way under the bus.

And while I'm sure what he's saying is true is true. The fact of the matter is, at the end of the day, it was his license on the line. It was his company that was on the line. Mm-hmm. So, and you

[00:34:32] Jess: hired the

[00:34:33] Mickey: idiot, right? Like, so it, and this, this has happened. I, I hear this all the time. It happens so much in construction, like, oh, it wasn't me, it was so-and-so, is it your company?

Okay, then it was you.

[00:34:44] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:34:45] Mickey: And so again, with this, after trying to falsely file an insurance claim against her homeowner's insurance. It wasn't met with, oh, we're gonna, you know, we're gonna give you some of your money back because we've now cost you this, this bookshelf that you weren't even planning on touching.

[00:35:03] Jess: Right.

[00:35:04] Mickey: And we were gonna compensate you for that. No, it was, don't worry, we're gonna do something really nice for you at the end. So I, you know, this is when she kinda reached out to me mm-hmm. And was like, all right, I don't know what to do here. Mm-hmm. And I was like, well, the first thing we are gonna do is we're gonna read your contract.

So we went through our contract and we're just like, Hey, listen. Where does it, does it talk about changes? Does it talk about, you know, if errors are made, like what the general contractor says they're going to do, and it didn't touch on that at all. Yeah. So then it was like, okay, so now you need to find out.

What amount of money

[00:35:39] Jess: mm-hmm.

[00:35:40] Mickey: Is, feels like a fair amount to be compensated for these things being damaged. 'cause obviously it's not just, oh, bulbs cost this much money. Right. It has an

[00:35:49] Jess: emotional,

[00:35:50] Mickey: an emotional value to it that. Honestly, money is not going to fix price. Mm-hmm. But I get to decide what I am, what nice thing I'm going to do for myself once this renovation is over.

That's not your job as a general contractor to offer me something nice.

[00:36:06] Jess: Yeah.

[00:36:07] Mickey: How much money are you compensating me for destroying irreplaceable plants? How much money are you compensating me for? Right. And here's the thing, why I think it matters that we hold people financially accountable is because at the end of the day.

Money is the biggest motivator.

[00:36:24] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:36:25] Mickey: How much that cost you, you messed it up and now it's gonna cost you an amount of money and that's going to affect your bottom line. And the hope is that if you make enough mistakes that cost you enough money, you will stop making that mistake. Mistake.

[00:36:40] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:36:41] Mickey: So.

How much did those, were those plans worth to you? How much was that bookshelf worth to you? Obviously it can never be replaced, but what amount of money is gonna make you feel better?

[00:36:50] Jess: Right?

[00:36:51] Mickey: So she went to the general contractor and said, actually, I don't want you to do anything nice for me. What I want for you is to do your job.

I am not going to to manage the project anymore. I'm not gonna tell you when materials are delivered. If you don't know you're in violation of your contract. So. Do what you said you're gonna do in the contract. Mm-hmm. And here is how much money I want for the bookshelf and for the plants that you guys damaged because you were just being careless and you weren't paying to have somebody monitoring the job.

[00:37:25] Jess: Right. And you can go ahead and fix the whole side of my house with your insurance. Stop trying to get high. A hundred

[00:37:30] Mickey: percent. So, yeah. And

[00:37:32] Jess: so what, where are they now? Are they,

[00:37:33] Mickey: so, um.

[00:37:35] Jess: Oh,

[00:37:35] Mickey: there is a little bit of a stalemate situation. Mm-hmm. So the second that,

[00:37:41] Jess: that she pushed back,

[00:37:42] Mickey: she pushed back. Mm-hmm.

All of a sudden, crickets. And the thing was, when I, when I, when I advised her of this, I was like, I want you to understand that if these people are truly unethical, they will ghost you. They're not going to take it seriously. You're not going to hear from them. So I wanted her to know, like. You know, it's a choose your own adventure moment.

Like

[00:38:07] Jess: right,

[00:38:07] Mickey: it's important for you to stand up for yourself. It's important for you to stand up for, you know,

[00:38:12] Jess: how much money has she already given him?

[00:38:14] Mickey: So I will say their deposit process was about 25% of the total. So it was something along the lines of like. 50, $75,000.

[00:38:25] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:38:26] Mickey: But, but she felt like they had like that money had been spent.

[00:38:31] Jess: Okay.

[00:38:31] Mickey: But I was like, you are, do not write them another check until you have it in writing. Mm-hmm. The agreement that they, they're going to compensate you for the bookshelf and for the plans.

[00:38:42] Jess: Right. Is the, is the siding covered with. Tarps now.

[00:38:45] Mickey: Yes. So they did it. That was the thing when the GC came out like, and he was like, oh, I'm so sorry.

I'm so sorry. This guy, he's the worst. Um, they came out. I'm so

[00:38:52] Jess: glad you have him on my project when he's the

[00:38:54] Mickey: worst.

[00:38:55] Jess: That's, thanks for that.

[00:38:57] Mickey: That is my point, like about, about mentioning that like. Think about how irresponsible it is as a business owner. Yeah. To just not take responsibility like those that is your employee that you put on this person's job that's paying you $230,000 for a kitchen bath and a deck renovation, like

[00:39:17] Jess: mm-hmm.

[00:39:17] Mickey: And you're, the first thing you do is throw them under the bus. You're only throwing yourself under the bus. Yeah. Like

[00:39:23] Jess: it makes me think of a project manager that we know

[00:39:25] Mickey: it does. A hundred percent.

[00:39:27] Jess: I don't even know

[00:39:27] Mickey: if I would call her a project manager. She calls herself, I would say that she's somebody who calls herself a project manager, that you should absolutely not let on your project.

Um, but it, it's that level of like accountability. Mm-hmm. Like I'm the owner it's my company. These are my employees. I'm not going to sit there and say, oh, you know, my guys are the worst. They're, my guys like, right. We screwed up. And, and, and it really kind of irked me, one, that he wasn't taking accountability for it, he was throwing it off on somebody else.

And two, they weren't offering to compensate her.

[00:40:05] Jess: Yeah. Like, they

[00:40:05] Mickey: were like, we then should do something nice for you. And, and when she, so she said that to me several times and I just stopped her and I was like, listen. What I think is nice and what you think are nice could be very different things, and if you just allow them to not financially compensate you for these massive failures

[00:40:23] Default_2025-11-12_1: mm-hmm.

[00:40:24] Mickey: You could end up at the end of the project having fully paid for everything and their idea of something nice could be flowers. Or

[00:40:30] Jess: a gift basket.

[00:40:31] Mickey: They did thousands of dollars of damage to your home. Mm-hmm. That is irreplaceable. And they're like, here's, here's some chocolates we don't know who

[00:40:40] Jess: a bottle of wine.

[00:40:41] Mickey: Right. Like, absolutely not. That's no. How much is this worth? Mm-hmm. Send them the change order. They had absolutely no problem sending her a change order. Mm-hmm. When she clarified that she didn't want a wood deck, she wanted reks. So they obviously understand the value of the dollar. Yeah. So, okay. You've damaged something that's irreplaceable.

Here's the value of that.

[00:41:00] Jess: Go fix it.

[00:41:01] Mickey: Yeah, go fix it. And so that she's still, they're still kind of still in progress. I think it's going to end where she's gonna have to replace 'em. And it's kind of like the story of how a builder who won the builder of the year award in less than six months after winning that award.

We'll probably be getting reported to the licensing board.

[00:41:22] Jess: I was gonna say, that's what she's gonna do, right? Yeah. Report him now. A

[00:41:23] Mickey: hundred percent. Her husband works in the permitting department, like they're not new here. Mm-hmm. And so that part of why I thought this was a really good story to bring to our viewers is.

So much, so many of us have, just have no experience in construction. This family did and they still were getting taken advantage of. They were still having this really crappy experience with the general contractor. They got multiple bids. They went with the middle number. They, you know, they made what was the person that had a

[00:41:51] Jess: reputation?

[00:41:52] Mickey: Yeah, he, they, they checked. They checked on. Mm-hmm. All like, he had won the builder of the air award. Like that's a huge deal.

[00:41:59] Jess: Right.

[00:41:59] Mickey: And so. The point is that no matter who you are, you can still find yourself in this situation. And the the lessons are, I don't like, I think it's important, like people make mistakes.

Mm-hmm. They make mistakes. Mm-hmm. But how they go about trying to fix it and taking responsibility for it, I think makes a really big deal.

[00:42:19] Jess: It really does. Because if a person comes and is like, oh my God, I'm so sorry. Let me. Take this amount of money off, you know?

[00:42:26] Mickey: Yeah.

[00:42:26] Jess: The total, or let me give you this, or I'll, you know, have somebody else custom build some bookcases for you.

I understand that they're not gonna be exactly the same. Right. But like, I'm going to do that for you. Like that changes your perception of like the person that made the mistake. Right. Okay.

[00:42:40] Mickey: They're taking

[00:42:40] Jess: responsibility. Yes. I'll stop being quite, they're.

[00:42:43] Mickey: Right. If you go, nah, I'm gonna file this under your insurance and

[00:42:48] Jess: like you're up the creek and I'll just do something nice.

You hate them.

[00:42:51] Mickey: Yeah. And that it's just like, Hmm. I feel like maybe business 1 0 1 should be, that's a continuing education class that they offer in North Carolina. Sir, whoever you are, you should probably take that. Hmm. Because that's bad business. , Doing something nice for somebody when you've damaged irreplaceable items.

Not one, but two on not the same occasion, but two separate occasions because you don't have supervision on the job. Mm-hmm. Okay. No, and I think that is a really, for everybody listening, you know, we're going in, we're, we're in the new year, we're going into it. Everybody's like, Hmm, maybe I wanna refresh my kitchen, or maybe.

Make sure that it is very clear in your contract, the amount of supervision that is going to be on that job. Who is gonna be your point of contact? Who are you going to be dealing with? Who's gonna be making sure deliver deliveries were made to your house? Who's gonna be checking on the subcontractors?

How frequently does the general contractor plan on being there or having a supervisor on the job? Mm-hmm. These things genuinely matter. They make a really big difference when it comes to what we're doing, the quality of the product that we're getting. I get it that in renovations there can't be a superintendent or so like a supervisor there the entire time.

But I personally think if you're spending $230,000, that does give you the right to every day that they're gonna have people working on your project. Mm-hmm. For you two at some point, see a supervisor, they should be checking on

[00:44:20] Jess: it. I mean, should they be coming in? To say like, oh, this is going to be done today.

And like, making sure with the guys that are going to be doing it, that they understand the assignment of what to touch, what not to touch. Be like, don't touch it.

[00:44:33] Mickey: Don't touch it. This is Jess as this is her favorite thing. Now I'm here for it. I support it. Foley, I have special trust, Jess, as don't touch it.

Um, and I, I think so. Mm-hmm. But I think, you know, so like Ma. My world is different. We contractually have to have qualified supervision on every job, anytime we have guys there. Hmm. So hence why we don't take on more work than we can handle, because I only have so many people that I, that I considered right?

Qualified superintendents. So we take on the amount of jobs that we can have a qualified supervisor on each job. I know that in residential, commercial, residential construction and renovation construction, it is different, but I think you should at least see the, the person, your point of contact. If you've got guys working on your job, they should be there either in the morning or at night.

Preferably both. Make sure they're starting out right, make sure they finished right, if they had had a qualified person on that job. The plants would've never been torn out because they would've gotten there right before the guys started doing stuff and said, Hey guys, don't mess with these plants, or We're gonna dig them up.

We're not just going to destroy them.

[00:45:41] Jess: Right?

[00:45:41] Mickey: The same thing with the, with the siding. May there come at the end and been like, oh wait, we have to tarp this. None of that would've happened, so. Making sure that you are very clear on how much this general contractor or their qualified supervisors plan on physically being on site.

[00:46:02] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:46:03] Mickey: Asking that question, how often are you going to be here

[00:46:06] Jess: now when you are getting the bids and stuff from the general contractors is usually the general contractor that's coming out to the house to like a

[00:46:13] Mickey: lot of times, yes.

[00:46:14] Jess: Yes. Can you ask to meet whoever the project manager is, is going to be so you can be like, absolutely.

Yes. Lemme see if I jive with you, because if I don't get the good vibe, like I don't want you in

[00:46:25] Mickey: my

[00:46:25] Jess: house.

[00:46:25] Mickey: Yeah, a hundred percent. Because think about it. It is your home that you're actively living in. Of course, you want to have a good relationship with the person that's gonna be your main point of contact.

[00:46:34] Jess: I don't want like a douche canoe, right?

[00:46:37] Mickey: Hundred percent. We don't have time for shenanigans like that. Um,

[00:46:41] Jess: I was like, what's a nice way of saying it? I don't know. One,

[00:46:43] Mickey: don't be a douche canoe. That's all I'm saying. Somebody I said that the other day and they go, somebody, some young person goes, oh, we're bringing that back.

And I was like, it went out.

[00:46:51] Jess: Oh, I've been saying it the whole time.

[00:46:53] Mickey: Yeah. Hashtag world. Here we go. Here we go. Old people. So making sure that you're really clear on how much your general contractor is gonna be on the job or your point of contact is gonna be on the job there that way and, and have it in writing.

That way, when you're not getting that kind of service, you can refer to your contract to be like you are in violation of our contract. You're contractually obligated to have somebody on the job. And here's the thing. Within the construction community, contracts are king. And so me saying, I think that you should be doing this, that, and the other does not matter to a general contractor.

They don't care what you think. Let's just be honest. They're like, this is what I do. I'm the expert. Nobody cares what you think, but if you have it in writing that there's going to be a point of contact for you to physically see at least once a day when you've got people working on your job site, on your house.

That is a job site. They don't do that. Then saying to a general contractor, you are in contract violation, that carries a lot more weight. However, that only works if you have that language

[00:48:08] Jess: in which, in the contract.

[00:48:09] Mickey: In your contract. So definitely having how frequently you should be seeing a supervisor, how frequent, frequently you should be interacting with them.

How frequently they should be checking on the physical work with their eyeballs, not with photos, not with FaceTime. Eyeballs, feet on the ground, boots on the ground that matters. And having, being clear with your general contractor on what your expectations are is important. If a GC doesn't have that kind of manpower, they're not gonna bid your job and that is better for you.

[00:48:40] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:48:40] Mickey: The other piece is like how having it in your contract, how we are, they're going to address. Damage done by others. So, you know, Bo both of these things, like obviously they were planning on re like replacing the deck, but she wasn't planning on re landscaping. So when they damaged irreplaceable perennials Yes, I, I'm sure they were lovely.

Um. What is, what is contractually their obligation to fix it. And if, again, if you don't have that in your contract, then you're kind of whims, you know, upon the whim of the contractor. So having some language that ha you know, in the event of

[00:49:20] Jess: mm-hmm.

[00:49:21] Mickey: Damage that is, you know, was done by others that wasn't, this wasn't part of our renovation.

These are the things that are going to happen to remedy the situation. Having that language so that you feel comfortable with it, so the general contractor feels comfortable with it. And here's the thing, when you have a really, really solid contract that protects both parties, everybody feels a lot more comfortable, but they also understand.

This isn't the job to be messing around on?

[00:49:48] Jess: No.

[00:49:49] Mickey: When your contract is rock solid, you are protected. The general contractor is protected. Everybody understands the expectations because it's literally in writing, and you are not the one that they're going to be putting their, the world's worst project manager on.

It's just they're, they're gonna protect their investments because they understand the financial burden of not. Unfortunately, people are people, money is the motivator. If people aren't properly motivated by money, I don't know what to tell you, but that is in construction, we're all doing it to try to get paid.

So making sure that there is a financial repercussion to them not is really important. So I feel like the overarching theme of this homeowner, homeowner horse, right, which is still ongoing, is. Make sure you have really strong contracts. Yes. Make sure you, you are clear about your expectations of how when people are gonna be there, that it is in writing that, and especially that you have it in writing, how damage to your home that is not part of the renovation will be addressed.

Mm-hmm. Because that happens more times than not. I mean, all of these homeowner horror stories, it's like, oh, and then they cut the pipe wrong and it leaked into the ceiling below, and that ceiling below wasn't a part. Right. Of their initial renovation. Mm-hmm. So making sure you know how they plan on handling it and that you all feel comfortable with the terms is really, really important.

[00:51:14] Jess: Yep. And that makes sure that the list of all the materials that you are going

[00:51:19] Mickey: to Yes. Your spec sheet have Yeah. Is really, really important to consider that when you're taking in the, the, the, the, the bids. Mm-hmm. Like so. Okay. This one has the trek. This one doesn't mention the trek. We need to follow up on that.

It's a lot of work for the homeowner, but I feel like that extra work in on the front end will make it so that you had a wonderful experience on the back

[00:51:42] Jess: end. Yeah. It's gonna make it so much smoother. Yeah. Because everything's in writing and that's like, and what is it? Um, being clear. Is being kind.

[00:51:49] Mickey: Yes.

Right. We went to this event and this lady was like, clarity is kindness. Mm-hmm. So being clear about your expectations. It, it's kindness, it's, and making sure that it's in writing, it is a kindness that you were doing to the general contractor, even if they don't see it that way. Clear clarity is kindness and making sure that everybody's aware of what your expectations are, the builder's expectations, and making sure that it's in writing.

I think that's the best way to have a really smooth renovation.

[00:52:15] Jess: Sounds it.

[00:52:16] Mickey: So we, when this story concludes, I'll keep you guys posted. Um, she did, she kind of felt like there she might be looking for a new general contractor and she would definitely be reporting this GC to the licensing board.

[00:52:30] Jess: Absolutely.

[00:52:30] Mickey: So they're going from builder of the year to Absolutely don't touch them. Um,

[00:52:35] Jess: real quick,

[00:52:35] Mickey: real quick. Neck breaking speeds. And

[00:52:38] Jess: even if they did finish, I would still report them.

[00:52:41] Mickey: I would definitely not. Leave a find star review. You know, I, while I have, um,

[00:52:50] Jess: I'll wait till like it's all done. Yeah, yeah. Natural so that

[00:52:53] Mickey: you don't sabotage my home.

[00:52:55] Jess: Yeah. More than you already have. We don't wanna make it anymore. Do

[00:53:00] Mickey: irreparable damage or whatever the

[00:53:02] Jess: word is. Be like, oh, I'm not gonna tell 'em that. Like my grandmother built. Right. Everything else in the house, nobody old touched anything else in the house. Don't, you don't have to ruin anything else.

[00:53:12] Mickey: Yeah. I'm like, if a house full of antiques, that's, we're not gonna touch that with a toe foot pole. Nope.

[00:53:16] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:53:17] Mickey: So if you have a homeowner horror story, we would love it if you would go to chicks in construction.com and just scroll down. There's a little, um, page where you kind fill out your story. Um, I'm gonna preface this.

We have, we have kind of been open to like any kind of story that you wanna share. That's great. We're here for it.

[00:53:36] Jess: Mm-hmm.

[00:53:37] Mickey: Um, whether it be a homeowner horror story or if you're a general contractor sharing a story about, you know, how, maybe how homeowners have interacted with that, that weren't the best.

Yep. I think that's really valuable to all of our watchers. If you're trying to sell us things. Mm, no, please don't go to chicks and construction.com and fill out that form.

[00:53:55] Jess: We're not buying

[00:53:56] Mickey: that, that we're not, we're not doing that. So, um, I think maybe I opened the door too widely. Um, we're not even going to respond if you send us messages to try to sell us things.

Just when we want a service, we will find you. So if you're a homeowner or a general contractor, or you in general have a great story that you think would provide. Um, some benefit to our watchers, please go to chicks, do chicks and construction.com and share that. If you want to sell us things, don't. We're on a budget and whatever you're selling isn't part of it.

[00:54:34] Jess: Be sure to like, and subscribe us. Subscribe us.

[00:54:37] Mickey: Subscribe us. Do it,

[00:54:39] Jess: be share to like and subscribe. And you can find us on all the social media channels, LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram at Chicks Construction Podcast, and on TikTok at Chicks Construction.

[00:54:49] Mickey: Yes, fine friends, and we will see you next time. Bye bye.